Something about not having extra gas money has drastically limited my photographic road trips this year.  So my outings were mostly limited to wandering around on my lunch breaks and walking to and from work (which I didn’t do nearly as much as I should have).

The first Monday of June I headed east down the street looking for interesting things to photograph; well, interesting to me at least. And I came across an intriguing lunch patio set up.

There is no sign associated with it as to who it belongs but I would assume it is for the Indian restaurant near it. I also wondered if you have to plug the meter to eat there.

From there I headed south and couldn’t help but notice that all the planters and trees looked so good.

As I got to the end of the street I decided go check out the fairly recently closed Redstone Grill and Wine Bar. My only experience with Redstone was going there with Lynda for our anniversary dinners one year and learning that it was the most expensive meal I ever rented as it went through me in about an hour.

Ppfftt, they shut you down for owing a measly 25K these days?

Heading back to work I noticed just how rough the city parks are looking these days.

A lot to see in a 6 block radius.

A couple days later I decided to head off in the heat (we had a hotter than average June) to Saro’s Restaurant for lunch. As I approached I noticed the “Open” sign was on, however, the door was locked (turns out they had to go man a booth at the Wednesday Market). So I had to come up with a plan B and as I walked past a few places I ended up at Hudsons (Which I had passed earlier). They were already geared up for Canada Day.

Monday, June the 12th found me wandering around City Hall Park. I’ve been working (well, the idea is in my head but not a lot of actual work has happened on it) on a series of photos that are “The view from the bench” in which I just sit on a bench and take a photo of what I see. I’ve been doing it for a while now but have yet to put the series together.

A couple of days later I noticed a piece of paper on our cardboard bin and upon closer inspection found it to be very interesting. I’m very much doubting the wind put it there.

Payday Friday I went out in search of lunch and decided the curry bar at the Timberlands Co-op was the winner. I parked down the road in the developing subdivision and was amazed how they prep the area for new construction.

They have an area of about 20 square blocks that have roads, sidewalks, back alleys and fences all installed before the houses are in. It’s way different than it used to be.

On Saturday, June 17th, Rob Brown from Panasonic was doing an in store demo for us so I grabbed a shot of him hard at work.

He really didn’t have much to do as it was a pretty slow work day but he ended up talking to a couple customers past the time he was supposed to leave.

Tuesday, June 20th found me feeling nostalgic (which is so shocking for me) and I went in search of stuff from the “old days.

It’s been just over 10 years since Dr. Brown passed away and his old clinic is looking pretty worse for wear.

His clinic had been in that building for many years but before that it had been an arcade and pool hall that I spent many an hour frequenting when I was supposed to be in class in high school. Steve MacKay and I would wander down there to see “Dr. Sid” (Sid owned the place) when he was undergoing “physio” for his broken finger. I’m pretty sure playing snooker on the 6×12 foot table really helped his healing.

My nostalgia doesn’t go far enough back to really remember when the building was the Greyhound depot. I’m pretty sure I remember it being there but I don’t recall actually being in it. I’ve been to it’s current location a lot (it is set to move anytime now).

I walked east and south and photographed another building that I spent a lot of money in back in the day.

That building used to house Dad’s Hamburger and Submarine and I spent many, many lunches and suppers in there when I worked at both the Bay and Zellers. I often got the hamburger sub (I can’t believe I used to eat that much at once). I can’t remember the fellow’s name that used to own it but when Coke changed the formula to “New Coke” he went out and bought up as much of the original stuff as he could find. He still had a bit left when Coke bowed to pressure and brought “Coke Classic” back.

Little did I realize just how far my nostalgia would be pushed that day as the beautiful blue sky held no hint as to the storm that would hit early in the evening. Straight line winds of about 110 kmph hit Red Deer and did a lot of damage in a short time.

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My friends Steve Parkin and Carl Ethier came and picked me up to go out and survey the destruction. The damage it did was spread out over a wide area and on the north side of the river near where I live it was amazing to see how much damage there was.

It hadn’t hardly rained during the storm but it started to spit a bit when I went out for a walk to survey the walking paths near my house. After about 10 minutes the rain stopped and the clouds dispersed rapidly. If you weren’t in a area effected by the storm (or had power) you would not believe it had ever happened when the sun came out in time for a most beautiful sunset.

Our power came back on at about 5:30 in the morning after being out for about 11 hours. Some parts of the city had to wait 3 or 4 days for their power to be reconnected.

I went in search of damage in Kin Kanyon park during my lunch break but didn’t have much time to look as I dodged rain drops.

I ran into one of the parks workers checking the trails and she told me there was a lot of damage not far from where we were but I didn’t have enough time to go look into it.

When I got back to work, Gord Webster from Fuji was at the store to do a demo day and he already had a customer to help out before he even got all set up.

Gord was very knowledgeable and once the store closed he did a staff training for us. It was almost as good as the pizza we had.

Almost a full week went by before I took any more photos. I walked to work on the 27th and saw this beauty just sitting there.

I’ve seen her there a few times this year but never seem to have the time to stop and get a photo.

I liked the look of the hanging baskets on Gaetz Avenue.

Many, many moons ago I used to have to look after similar baskets when I worked at Kapps Hobby House. We took them in every night when we closed and put them back out every morning.

Once I got over to the Ross Street Patio I noticed a fellow playing the street piano. After a bit a 2nd gentleman started singing. They were pretty good. This gave me a couple more shots for my bench series.

As I headed back towards work I looked over the renovations going on at the old Ranch House location. (I honestly don’t remember which bar had been in that location since).

I’m not sure what is going in there but it has been totally gutted.

I didn’t have a long enough lens to record a shot I saw. There was a landscape crew putting plants in at the building behind work and a long haired, bearded fellow was crouched on the trailer hitch checking the contents of the trailer. From a distance it looked like he was sitting in the trailer and that someone had thrown out a perfectly good hippy.

Just past the workers a bunny was in the park behind work. The grass was shorter than the last time I saw it but now it’s full of clover.

The only real road trip I did in June was to go to my son’s, girlfriend’s high school graduation in Cremona. I took a few photos at the cap and gown ceremony and we headed back to their family farm to do a few more.

I had a lot of fun taking pictures of Randell and her family and we did some with Lynda and Adam as well. Seemed at the time I took lots, but as I edited them I realized I could of taken more.

So that was my June in a nutshell. While it wasn’t all that exciting, all in all it wasn’t terrible either.