visitor centre

Happy birthday to my brother-in-law, Kaarel!

Today's Blatherpics are from our visit to the Algonquin Park Visitor's Centre yesterday afternoon. Jeff and I tend to visit the Centre at least once a year, usually with our visitors. In addition to housing some interesting science/biology and historical exhibits, the building is air-conditioned with a decent bookstore and a cafeteria. It's a great place to take children on a rainy day, or just to browse for a change of pace during a long visit.





Jeff's family contributed towards one of the exhibits in the Centre, commissioning a sculptress friend to create a bust of Tom Thomson, a famous Canadian painter and member of the Group of Seven, whose mysterious death has evoked much controversy and speculative books over the years:





It was interesting to examine the reproduction of the Tom Thomson cairn after seeing the real cairn on a lake tour boat trip only a couple days before:





And each time that Jeff and I go to the Visitor Centre, I always visit the Wolf Howl exhibit. When the Centre was first being built, people had the opportunity to donate in someone's name to sponsor exhibits. Jeff and I donated in the names of my brother and his wife. A plaque with all donor names is displayed beside each exhibit. Jim and Diane both loved Algonquin:





Unbelieveably, I'm still on track re: my novel writing. My goal by the end of this month is to have written about 37,000 words. Next month: finish the first draft (I'm aiming for a total of approximately 50,000 words total for a middle reader novel), revise/edit.

This coming week will be pretty busy since I have a column due for Writing World in addition to two sets of biweekly updates for the site (since I'll be away in California during one of my deadlines) and a Muse's Muse column, in addition to my daily Market Watch and novel writing goals.

Hey, and I've even started writing a new song while I'm at the cottage! :-)