{"id":882,"date":"2011-01-26T04:43:33","date_gmt":"2011-01-26T04:43:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/?p=882"},"modified":"2011-01-26T04:43:33","modified_gmt":"2011-01-26T04:43:33","slug":"bc-rocks-and-trees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/2011\/01\/26\/bc-rocks-and-trees\/","title":{"rendered":"BC rocks! (And trees!)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I like rain.<\/p>\n

I need<\/em> rain.<\/p>\n

During my first summer in Vancouver, there was a dry spell that lasted for five or six weeks. By the third week I started to feel a bit weird, but couldn’t work out why. I felt weirder and weirder as time went on, but didn’t realise why until I suddenly found myself literally running from the room as I heard the first few drops hit the skylight, to stand in the middle of the garden and let the downpour drench me to the skin. I\u00a0suddenly felt normal again.<\/p>\n

People are astonished when I say “I kinda wish it would rain” in the middle of a long stretch of hot and sunny days. (Don’t get me wrong, I love the sunshine too. I’d just enjoy it more if I could get a half-day or so of rain every week in the middle of summer). But rain is awesome; why wouldn’t you miss it? Rain\u00a0is the reason why Vancouver is so green, why the cherry blossoms look so gorgeous in the spring, and why we won’t have to worry about water shortages any time soon.<\/p>\n

HOWEVER,<\/p>\n

it’s been raining for weeks on end, and even my exceptionally high tolerance for the stuff is under serious threat. I think my love of rain is turning into a love-hate relationship.<\/p>\n

I need some sunlight, damnit!\u00a0I left work half an hour earlier than usual last night, and it was dark even then. And oh so rainy; I was soaked within a couple of blocks. My cycling shoes were still damp this morning.<\/p>\n

Yeah, sure, there are snowdrop shoots coming up. Big whoop; it’s too wet to be able to enjoy even that beautiful sight while outside.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I came home tonight in a soggy wet grump, and snuggled up with a cat and a blankie to cheer myself up with the photos from our beautiful sun-drenched kayak trip to Desolation Sound<\/a> last summer. And that’s when I remembered that I’d taken some photos of the local geological features, for Silver Fox<\/a> and assorted other geoblog buddies, but forgotten to post them!<\/p>\n

I know approximately 1.002 x bugger all about geology, so the descriptions are just guesses:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Seam of something iron-rich and something white (I thought it might just be caked-on sea salt, but I was wrong)<\/p><\/div>\n

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"Pebbles" of hard rock poking through the eroded top layer of softer, paler rock. This surface was exposed to the waves at high tide<\/p><\/div>\n

While we’re at it, here are some shots I took of arbutus trees. I’d never even heard of this wonderful tree before I moved here, but on my first trip to Victoria we saw one in a park, a friend encouraged me to join her in stroking the smooth wood exposed by the peeling papery bark, and I was hooked. There aren’t any arbutus trees in Vancouver itself, but we see lots on our kayaking trips, and I always have to go and stroke them. In the warmth of the sun, the wood feels so smooth and warm it’s almost like touching human skin.<\/p>\n

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Well, thank you for indulging me! I feel a bit better now, remembering the joys of summer.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Light at the end of the tunnel<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I like rain. I need rain. During my first summer in Vancouver, there was a dry spell that lasted for five or six weeks. By the third week I started to feel a bit weird, but couldn’t work out why. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,32,19,35,8,82],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-buddies","category-nature","category-personal","category-photos","category-vancouver","category-whining"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=882"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/vwxynot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}