You make your desk pretty. There is something about pretty things that inspire me to work. It can be anything from a pretty notebook and pen to pretty paper and post-its to a pretty computer monitor and keyboard to a pretty vintage bulletin board. Think of it as creating the right atmosphere / environment conducive to productivity – whatever that environment is to you. To me, it’s prettiness (coupled with functionality of course).

My Macbook Pro is fairly new from November 2012 and I had intended on getting the Mac Thunberbolt monitor to go with it because the last thing I want is to be working on complicated school projects in a teeny-tiny laptop screen. I couldn’t justify the cost of the Thunderbolt though, so I searched high and low for a pretty white monitor. Here I am with this beautiful cheap and cheerful 21.5″ BenQ monitor that they call the “Macbook Companion”. I’d have to agree because she is quite perfect for the job. I couldn’t be more satisfied.

Long story short: I purchased a set of books (for a birthday gift) two weeks ago from Amazon and it was never delivered by the estimated delivery date. Naturally, I called DHL, the shipping company responsible, to track my package. On this call, I learned that my package had to be sent back to Amazon due to ‘incomplete delivery information’. This happened despite the fact that I’ve absolutely and positively entered my shipping address correctly with no mistakes at Amazon’s check-out. I had Amazon contact DHL directly to find out exactly what had happened only to learn that the characters in Amazon’s address field did not translate properly to DHL’s system, resulting in ‘incomplete delivery information’ that led to my package having to be sent back to Amazon.

The million dollar question: How is this my problem?

It isn’t my problem and yet I’ve fallen victim to the situation and Amazon did absolutely nothing to remedy it. The only two options provided were:

(1) To refund the order and be out of a birthday gift that I needed by Saturday

(2) To refund the order and re-purchase a new set of books at a higher price because we could not locate the same set of books for the same price as my initial purchase. They could not price match, could not offer to incur shipping costs, could not offer expedited shipping to meet my deadline, and basically could not offer a single accommodating ‘We’re-really-sorry-for-this-and-here’s-what-we’ll-do’ solution to help improve the customer experience. A straight replacement of my original order was not feasible for reasons I really don’t understand and can’t even begin to explain even if I tried.

And that’s the last time I’ll ever shop at Amazon. And of course, I’ve taken the time to share my negative experience on my little platform on the web. I ended up purchasing the books from Barnes & Noble and paid $20 less than my initial purchase at Amazon.

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Moving on – these are the colourful hippie houses and shops at Kensington Market in Toronto.

This was shot at Kensington Market last weekend. I should group all my Toronto photos together and start an I love Toronto series, because surely, Toronto rocks. If Toronto didn’t snow and had weather like Los Angeles, it would rock even harder.

Until freedom departs. Until the first day of full time work, part time school status. Stress management is key. No stress. I think you get better at this as you get older. I used to be a serious stress case and sometimes I still am.

Caught this article on my Facebook newsfeed, shared by Schulich.

But nonetheless, I’m a good sport and am here to share another shot of night lights in my humble and quiet neighbourhood (although it is evident that these types of shots would be infinitely more exciting at the corner of Yonge and Dundas in Toronto or at Time Square in Manhattan or by the Big Ben on Bridge Street in London).

I can’t believe it’s the last day of March already. The year is zipping by too fast for comfort.

Andrea and I went shooting in the dark of night last night. I never take pictures in the dark but now I think I will. I’ll post a couple of night light photos in the next few days.

I’ve loved the natural sunlight for most of my photographic journey but light in general, is an all around stunner and doesn’t just come from daylight. Artificial lights of the night can be just as beautiful, in an entirely different way. I think I have a new addiction.

Going to pump some air into my bicycle tires and take her out for a ride today… because speaking of lights, the day happens to be radiating with it. I smell Spring.

I’m ready for my long weekend filled with good company.

My weekends are filling up with one-on-one coffee, brunch, and lunch dates with people I love as I prepare to disappear from the face of the Earth when school starts in a month. It’ll mostly be one-on-one dates with the desk and textbooks for a little while until I establish a new and effective system / routine.

This is Sarah and I last Fall. Nothing beats photo dates. We’ll be at it again this weekend. :)