Sun 1 Jun 2008
The picture is the post folks. Here, our little Solomon, probably 6 years old, is on a Washington State beach near La Connor. I wasn’t there that day but his Grampa took him around the county with his cousins looking for adventure and whatever came their way.
Gramps, you take good photos. 
Tue 27 May 2008
A new home again, this time a real house for our Family. From a downtown apartment to a 2br, 1ba condo at the quay, we moved back to my ‘backyard’ and set up shop for two years. We have loved our time here at the Quay in New West but the space is too small for us with the Baby and our bigger boy (and Wagner the Schnauzer).
So after some hunting and some Real Estate shenanigans, we have almost completed the purchase of the house above, near Lord Tweedsmir Elementary and next door to Grimston Park in New West. Our place here at the Quay is sold ad we are scheduled to move in early July.
The house has a great view, a great yard and a great basement suite that we an rent to make it all happen. Anyone looking for a super 2 bedroom suite near 22nd st station may want to get in touch. Perfect tenants only please.
Expect a housewarming announcement soon!
Mon 26 May 2008
In a post that leads with the words “Goodness, retired people can get quite confused” my mother posted this photo of my Grandfather Alder Gilbert Elton and his twin sister Evelyn. I really love old photos of my relatives and the lives they lead. I feel it gives me connection. 
Further to that, my cousin John Tomkinson in Alberta, his wife Melissa and his 3 (and counting) kids are erecting a family sized teepee. That is right folks, custom made and ready this summer, this handsome accommodation will essentially sleep the whole extended family. My little tribe will be visiting them in August to try it out. It is currently under construction. See here the poles being prepared for deployment. 
On the front of the entrance flap of the structure, shall be painted our best approximation of our family crest. John and I agreed that the crest pictured here would be most fitting.
The next thing to do I guess is to go out to the barn and strap on some armor, get a lance and have a go at bashing each other over the heads with pointy things. Ahh, the good old days…
Mon 26 May 2008
What will become of the world if the boomers all retire and take up blogging? For a peek into the future, see ELTONBIRD , my mother’s new website.
I wish her all of the happinesses that come from blogging and I live in the new realization that:
– She will be reading all of my posts
– I am now fully shamed into posting again
Egad indeed.
Fri 20 Jul 2007
Well what a long and strange trip it has been! After close to six months of inoperative blogs due to un-cooperative Blue-Hosts, I now have Willbop to share with you again. I have somehow managed to reain all of my history, unlike Breebop, who has lost everything:
Apparently the error was resolved back in January, but the block was never removed from my account, so I thought the various fixes I’d tried were ineffective. After several fruitless attempts to communicate with the Bluehost ‘help’ folks in which they told me again and again to ‘check my scripts’ I uninstalled WordPress in a desperate hope that it might fix the problem. The error messages persisted, and by this point, I was having a baby and was otherwise occupied…All I can say is beware of Bluehost. If you’re thinking of signing with them, forget it. There are so many providers out there, you don’t need to risk trouble with one that has already demonstrated incompetence. And back up your archives.
In honour of my return to your cyber space, I present to you a synopsis, some of which you may already know…
Got Girl, Moved in on her, got dog, got Corolla, got house, married girl, Portugal, got pregnant, Had baby Wesley,
Ta Da!
Dad and Wesley
Fri 5 Jan 2007
Or how I learned to suck it up and write something for my web-log after being lazy and overwhelmed with other things.
Firstly dear reader, we are proud and excited to announce the future arrival of a new member of our family. That’s right! A new baby is my first news of the new year! Briana and I are due to welcome our new squirmie on May 15th and we are deep into the traditional pursuits of determining baby names, finding neat modern parenthood gadgets (we simply must have if we want to hang out with the cool moms ad dads) and worrying about the myriad or controversial mommy-baby health topics (where some one is almost always compared to Hitler predictably). Boy , girl, we don’t know and the white coats won’t tell us (no matter how much we try to stick it to the MAN) but whatever baby chooses for its birthday suit, this is the perfect time for us to add to our family and Briana and I could not be happier.
This Christmas and for the first time, Briana and I hosted the season’s festivities. With lots of help from family and friends we had a great time over five days of revolving door visitors, dinner parties and house guests. I just loved it and I learned (thanks mom) how to make a killer turkey and awesome gravy. As for seasonal swag, I scored an awesome black coat as a gift from Briana. Its funny! We both got each other pajamas, a coat, and kitchen gadgets.
While I have not been blogging myself to any meaningful extent, I have been fluttering around the bloggosphere like a geeky butterfly getting to know other blogs and enjoying old favorites. This activity is a lot of fun for me and responsible for countless hours of inactivity and over use of the scroll wheel on my mouse. On this subject, I announce a new series on Willbop: Wherin I review some blogs I am reading and what I like and don’t and other bloggie stuff.
Those Crazy Blogs
Sat 30 Dec 2006
No one rerally takes me seriously but I really do want some ordinance one day for Christmas. Like these two small field pieces in the Amsterdam City Museum, setting up for a bit of artillery can be a wholesome family activity on a bracing winter morning. What more do you need to give you a spring in yus step than the deep chest feeling of a dissapating shockwave? What gift could more say “titings of comfort and joy” than a canon no longer used in bellicose employ? Naught, says I.
Blogged with Flock
Sat 16 Dec 2006
Not to much longer than four years ago, my dad embarked on a process designed to fulfil a long held desire. He would apply his talent at drawing and art to training and practice with the result that he would become an artist. Even his earliest paintings were stunning and the obvious talent displayed in his work carried through into his paintings even before he had developed his more technical skills.
I have one of his more recent works here. As usual, I have no idea what the title is so I am calling it “Shelter Bay from Behind the Snowy Evergreen” by Richard Tomkinson Dec 2006.
Tue 7 Nov 2006
My pal Nicole, pictured here at our wedding in September, has just birthed her first babies! That is right my pluralisticly minded readers! Two little boys Cole and Aiden. Congratulations to you Nicole and your little, squirmy family!
On a related note, I was recently struck by the resemblence between my friend Nicole and the TV actress “Ali Larter” from the (very good) TV show Heroes. As I have all of this nifty tech before me, I present for your comparison a photo of Ali Larter so that you might judge for yourself if the resemblence I reckon they share is in fact or in fact is fiction…
Now I am not bringing up this ancillary topic just to artificially boost my site viewer numbers. Bree and I really disagreed on this until I saw the show again. My mind is made up. Doppelganger. But you know what is funny? I didn’t even ask her yet if the twins were identical…
Sun 29 Oct 2006
I am chilled to the bone. My gooseflesh is so bad I have to tell you what it is called in German: Geizenfleisch, yup, Geizenfleisch. I am just that wigged out.
I have just seen this video on www.youtube.com. The video can not be embedded here by the request of the author or I would have just stuck it in this post but you all have to see it. ALL OF YOU! IN FULL SCREEN MODE. I am serious people. Watch it RIGHT till the end.
The Cremation of Sam McGee is one of the family poems / pieces or writing like that of Kipling or Wm. E. Henley we read at family gatherings and remember our parents, grandparents and good times we all have shared. It is a comfort to share some of these year after year and a topic of constant explanation to guests.
The video I am referencing here is of a man skillfully reciting the Robert Service Classic The Creation of Sam McGee in a slow, erie and deeply personal way. I applaud him for his artistry. See the video! Here then, so that you all can read along, is the text. 
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ’round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that he’d “sooner live in hell”.
On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.
And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”
Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursed cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ’tain’t being dead — it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”
A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.
There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say:
“You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”
Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows — O God! how I loathed the thing.
And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.
Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May”.
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”
Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared — such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.
Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.
I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked”; . . . then the door I opened wide.
And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm –
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
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