I'm sad now, and here's why. Flickr looks like it's going through some crap, too.

Pod/Clifford f/3.5 @ 1/400 sec

I haven't had any substantial updates on activity in the last little while, largely since Robin and I have both been busy doing. Christmas shopping lead into our Christmas trip, which lead into the prep and hanging of my photo show. Oh, and I was on pager this past week.

House Wine/World Market

More cam pics

Robin and I were checking out from World Market, yesterday. I was photographing this display and another gent in line, maybe 20 years my senior was looking at the display of house wine and recounting grocery shopping from the early-to-mid-1980s where there were aisles of generic groceries in the strictest sense.

Not private label products mind you. Generic. Simple white (or in the case of Lucky's in Sacramento, yellow) packaging with a big sans-serif font. "Beer," or "Cereal." No photos or artwork. Just a word.

Revelry/Raleigh
Originally uploaded by base10.

As everyone (I hope) knows, the Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup last night. I was back in town and ventured down to The Point, one of the restaurants at Five Points to watch the game.

As the game ended, I captured the scene, and uploaded to Flickr when I got home. Celebration ensues. What make this personally cool is that not one, but two publications contacted me via Flickr this morning to use the shot on their sites. See coverage at The Torontoist.

NowPublic contacted me, but I wasn't able to get an account created to approve the selection. On the other hand, a few other Raleigh Flickr folks did get picked up.

This is pretty much how I'd like to see the Creative Commons work.

Monday

My extended weekend wrapped up well, getting both weights and a ride in during yesterday's fantastic weather. I also got the first draft of my fundraising letter together. About the only thing I didn't accomplish from my weekend list was finishing Best American Travel Writing 2005, but that's completely fine.

Work

Listened/participated in a webcast of Dan Gillmor speaking at Harvard's Berkman Center. I'll have a separate post about this shortly.

Buddy, the Holiday Brownie f/5.6 @ 1/60 sec

Tom, Bethany, badger and others have long mentioned or participated in Father and Son as gallery, music venue and store. If I need an emergency Tiki or G.I Joe headset walkee-talkees, I know where I'm going to look first.

Since there's usually something worth seeing there on First Friday, lady_ishmael and I dropped in on the way from Artspace to Glenwood South [1] with and promptly spotted several cameras including a range finder and the Kodak Holiday Brownie above. Parting with $8.48, it is mine. I mean, I couldn't just leave it there, could I?

I believe the film format for this Brownie is 127, which should be fun to find. I do have a 127 spool, however.

1. Has anyone else heard of Glenwood South referred to as GloSo?

Just before 1 a.m./Horseshoe Falls f/9 @ 15 sec

About fourteen hours of driving on New Year's Eve after twelve or so hours of driving on Dec. 30 brought me from the Upper Peninsula to Raleigh. Well, almost all the way to Raleigh. The yearly odometer flipped over when I was passing through Zebulon on U.S. 64.

Uh, oh/I-81 f/6.3 @ 1/160 sec

Industry/Escanaba f/25 @ 1/20 sec

I'm wrapping up conversations with my parents and grandparents. Seeing most of my cousins on my mother's side of the family was very good. Sara, Jackie and Rick reintroduced me to ucker. Now, if I there's anyone in Raleigh who plays...

There's a snowstorm heading in from Minnesota now, so I'm going to attempt to get into the Lower Peninsula before about 1 p.m. or so, then dash for either Ohio or Ontario. I think I'm going to let weather dictate. I suspect the weather's going to be interesting enough to preclude a trip up to Lake Superior. Aside from the day my parents and I caravanned, the weather's been overcast. Hopefully, closer to the Mackinaw Bridge, the clouds will at least break, as there are some very nifty sand dunes along Lake Michigan I neglected to photograph on the trip in.

Anyhow, more on the trip later, probably in individual conversations with interested folks when I get back to North Carolina, which is looking like either New Year's Eve or New Year's Day, "depending." Looking forward to seeing deviant_, katzj and purrmeow, if I can, before they all head back to Boston.

"Travels to Michigan" has several new photos from Escanaba.

Bare Tree I/Gera f/14 @ 1/40 sec

A bit of the week, as mentioned previously, has been spent getting caught up on some reading. I'll probably finish System of the World tonight or early tomorrow. In Saginaw yesterday with my mom to find a couple of last minute Christmas gifts, what started out as one replacement book became to and multiplied again to four when my grandmother dropped some Mitchner on the kitchen table.

A couple of roadtrips thus far the last two afternoons, but it's been quite pleasant scaling back from the usual pace, getting the dog outside in the snow, and discussions with my folks. It's quite plain where I come from, if I become a detatched observer of conversations with my parents and to a lesser extent, my grandmother.

The trip's already given me a fair bit to think about, as last year's trip did, some good, some a bit more difficult to rectify. In between the conversations and such, I am getting out for photography and (finally) have some ideas on photographs I want to pursue while I'm here.

The start of the "Travels to Michigan" photo set is up, with more on the way.

High and Dry/Escanaba f/12 @ ~1/450 sec

Sitting at home creating iPod playlists, checking out Flickr and locating my birth certificate in case I want to visit Canada on my trip were necessary or otherwise good things. Still, I'd be lying if I said it was how I wanted to spend the evening.

Otherwise, the day was productive, finishing most of my gift preparation this afternoon, getting the house cleaned and some gifts delivered. A big thanks to Ty and Glenda in the Raleigh Flickr Group for their invaluable assistance in getting several of this year's Christmas gifts together. The group is an awesome bunch of people and the assistance and favors provided are greatly appreciated.

Tomorrow, sometime mid-morning, I get in the newly re-shod Mazda 3 and head for Michigan. I'll likely be stopping somewhere in Ohio overnight and finishing the drive to Kingston in the Lower Peninsula Monday afternoon. Then, on Boxing Day, it's up to the Yoop. While yes, it's winter and damn cold [1], it's beautiful in it's sparseness. The drive is excellent alone time to think, too.

Past the hotel tomorrow and on the way back, my connectivity is going to be scarce as well, so I'll say this to everyone now: Joyeux Noël [2] and safe travels.

1. During last year's drive, I got out at a rest stop somewhere near Gaylord, MI and the temperature was -4 F. At 4 p.m.
2. Hopefully peeving Bill O'Reilly with my holiday greeting en française.

• Tonight: Night Three of the Great Cover-Up.
• Monday: Rogue Wave @ Local 506
• Wednesday: The American Analog Set @ Wetlands [1]
• March 14: NIN in Richmond, Va. Two nights later in Greenville, SC. [2]

I hope that at any of these shows that I'm not asked allegorical questions by drunk people interested in my camera as happened at The Bravery show in October.

1. Need to remember to drop off a membership form at Wetlands Monday...
2. That would make the Triangle or Winston-Salem date March 15? Maybe?

Saturn V/Air and Space Museum f 3.5 @ 1/13

Capsule/Air and Space Museum f 3.5 @ 1/250

From my recent DC trip

NASA's Apollo 11 mission page

MAKE:Blog introduced me to Celestia, free planetarium software with oodles of add on objects and texture maps.

I'm vaguely adding some use of the Flickr API to the Under the Flickr Services to my perpetual personal software project. I get to browsing some of the other services, and I found this.

Saturday, I caught Howl's Moving Castle with Jamie and ambermae over at the Carolina Theatre in Durham. The short take is that, we all liked it, but I don't think it was nearly as compelling as either Spirited Away or Princess Mononoke.

Kudos as well to Ryan for hosting a multitude of people, some of whom i might remember the names of, and successfully debuting his first homebrew.

Friday, post work didn't involve much other than assembling a few and negotiating the road trip to Philly in a couple weeks with ambermae and gorksi, largely around watching the new TMBG DVD, Here Come the ABCs. Good times, good times.

Coffee calls.

For the first night in a while, I didn't go out after work. In fact, I left work, got groceries and dinner and have spent the evening inside doing some photo editing and reading catch-up. I've been incredibly social of late and tonight, I felt the mild pull to just stay in. and it feels pretty good. On the upside, I finished the photo editing and grouping of my trip in DC. I don't think, however, I'll be able to do a write-up of the weekend as I should do in short order. Perhaps over the weekend.

One of my occasional browses turned up a heartbreaking sad note today and it seems much more personal in its sparseness than reading about the Underground bombings in London. I simply can't imagine losing someone after being married just under one month.

Waiting/Smithsonian Station f 4.5 @ 1/20

Departure/Smithsonian Station f 3.5 @ 1/100

I'm back home and back to work finishing a Google Sitemaps script. I didn't get much accomplished after getting home last night, other than visiting with saspenguin and Jason. Before leaving town, there was a visit to the Air and Space Museum, followed by sandwiches back in Arlington at Cosi, which were very tasty. On the way, it seemed like we had a great exit for traffic, then I stopped at the Potomac Mills IKEA to use a gift certificate i got last year or the year before. Thanks bumperfish and pastryarchitect. Forty-five minutes later, the traffic volume had increased significantly and we crept along between 15 and 35 mph to a few miles past Fredricksburg. Next time, I'll know better.

I've done some photo processing, but with about 1,100 to go through, getting more posted will be a little while longer, but hopefully I'll have a gallery done by Saturday. I appreciate people expressing eagerness to see new work. I also appreciate your patience as I get things together.

Fireworks/Washington Monument f 5.6 @ 1/25

A near perfect day. Even the getting out of DC while law enforcement tested the evacuation plan wasn't so bad. One hour, 45 minutes back to Arlington, Va. after walking from the west lawn of the Capitol to Metro Center with motorcades of screaming police cars and motorcycles along the way. And, from what I saw, it looked like they were doing more than simply making sure traffic ran smoothly. It looked like there were times when they were testing if a motorcade could run counter to a traffic flow to get to and from certain points. But that's just speculation on my part.

More photos to post from the trip when I'm back in Raleigh.

Pillars/FDR Memorial f 8.0 @ 1.6 sec

After seven or so hours of walking around DC monuments followed by a night tour of some of the same monuments, I've spent time in between watching NASA give a comet a charley horse and culling photos for posting. I'll have a lot more from the trip either tomorrow or Tuesday.

While looking at other Lensbaby photographer archives, stumbled across tangental evidence of one of the last shows I was in during my time in Sacramento. Part of a show based on the Mirror Project.

Pull the photo and from left to right, we have:

• Sarah Hatter
• Derek Powazek
• Heather Champ
• Yours Truly
• bumperfish

All at Muffins, Etc. on H Street, down the way from Camera/Arts. Good times, good times.

ambermae and I hit Porter's, then out to a couple of First Friday events. Largely, down to Father and Son to catch part of badger's set, which ambermae said reminded her of a film school film score. Pretty slick. Tried getting some additional shots with the new lens, but didn't come away with anything great, some OK. I'm still getting used to where the sweet spot moves and guessing at the metering. But, it has potential, and that's key.

Out the backdoor f 2.0 @ 1/1600 (lensbaby)

So, of potential interest to bumperfish, purrmeow and deviant_, I picked up a Lensbaby after work. It takes some getting used to, more from the metering aspect than the focal plane distortion. I'll be bringing it up to DC this weekend so, I should get an opportunity to completely overuse this. I also found that Nikon part DK-20 is a nice eyecup replacement on the D70. $2 more than the original part replacement to total $7, but it seems much more secure.

Pilotdrift/Keytar! f 4.0 @ 1/20

Eisley/Sherri f 4.5 @ 1/13

The review/show notes are still in progress, but I figured I'd put the photos up tonight. The Eisley, Lovedrug and Pilotdrift Flickr set is here.