Day 242: August 30, 2010

Suburban Fountain

While taking a shortcut through an office park near my school today, I spotted this fountain in the middle of a pond.  It worked better in monochrome - I especially liked the reflections.

Day 241: August 29, 2010

Pollination

Visited the Matthei Botanical Gardens in Ann Arbor today.  The bees were everywhere and were very busy getting in some end-of-summer pollination.  There were also a lot of decorated flamingos but that's another story for another day.

 

Day 240: August 28, 2010

Incongruous Garlic

So I ate at a restaurant in Ann Arbor that is called Quarter Bistro.  As you might guess from the name, it is a New Orleans-themed restaurant.  Upon leaving, I looked up and above the door I saw this giant clove of garlic.  Now, I like garlic as much as the next person (I even ate at an all-garlic restaurant once in San Francisco called The Stinking Rose), but I don't really associate garlic with New Orleans.  The building formerly housed a restaurant called Rio Bravo.....nope....no connection between Mexico and garlic either that I can think of.  Odd.  But very good food!

Day 239: August 27, 2010

Hidden Beauty

Found this single blossom hiding at the very back of my yard.  Another accidental planting, I think!

Day 238: August 26, 2010

Shadow Tree

The weather today was phenomenal!  Feels like fall is finally on the way! (I'm ignoring the forecast that calls for upper 80's again this weekend.)  The early evening sun made some fantastic shadows at Wildwood Park tonight.  I think the shadow tree looks a lot better than the real one!

Day 237: August 25, 2010

Finally - The Moon!

Finally, the trees and clouds cooperated and I had my tripod and telephoto lens....and the picture is still lame.  Oh well.  It looked a lot cooler than this picture.

Day 236: August 24, 2010

Pink Blossom

This is a cheat.  I tried to take a picture of  the full moon on the actual date of the full moon (today) but it was cloudy.  Very sad.  So this was taken a couple of days later at Wildwood Park.

Day 235: August 23, 2010

Accidental Squash Blossoms

So I really wanted to take a shot of the full moon and clouds tonight.  Driving home from my daughter's volleyball practice it looked AMAZING!  But I was driving! And I didn't have my telephoto lens! And I didn't have my tripod!  So the minute I got home I swapped lenses, grabbed the tripod, and ran out the door to shoot the moon.  Sadly, my neighborhood is so densely treed I could barely see any sky at all, certainly not the part of the sky with the moon.  I walked (tripod over my shoulder) for several blocks in all directions - no luck.  My neighbors probably think I'm a bit odd at this point.

So instead, I've posted a shot of the accidental squash blossoms growing at school.  I took this while waiting for volleyball to be finished - it was more twilight than full night.  They are accidental because they weren't actually planted.  Last fall, a parent donated some pumpkins and squash to decorate the center island in the school driveway.  Apparently, some planted themselves.  The vines have taken over and are already producing squash!

Technically, it's not a full moon til tomorrow (or at midnight tonight) so I am going to try again tomorrow night to capture the moon!

Day 234: August 22, 2010

Tree Pods

Today was the back-to-school ice cream social sponsored by PTO at the school where I teach.  I took a ton of pictures of the kids and parents enjoying ice cream and playing on the swings and other playground equipment.  Some are really good, but I didn't get anyone's permission to publish them here, so you get the tree instead.  There are a few of these trees in the playground and ever fall they drop these massive seed pods everywhere. I have no idea what sort of tree they are (a shameful thing for a science teacher to admit!) but they are unlike any other tree I've seen around here. I suspect they are native to some other climate.

Day 233: August 21, 2010

Another Cheat

As noted in Friday's post, I've been a slacker this weekend.  This is another sunflower from the manicurist's place.  I love sunflowers!

Day 232: August 20, 2010

First Day!

OK, so her first day of high school classes was actually Wednesday.  I have been a bit of a slacker this weekend with taking photos, so I'm cheating a bit. I did take this on her actual first day - in the parking lot to minimize her level of embarrassment.  A far cry from the photo below of Natalie on her first day of first grade!  My little girl is growing up!

Day 231: August 19, 2010

Yes, It's Duct Tape

Duct Tape comes in all sorts of colors and patterns now.  My daughter loves them all and makes everything from wallets to roses to hair bows from it.  Here she is modeling her latest creation (and it's also the only way she'll let me post a picture of her here).

Day 230: August 18, 2010

Sunflower!

There were some HUGE sunflowers in front of the place I get my nails done.  After my manicure at lunch time today I grabbed the camera from the car and took some pictures. This one is my favorite!

Day 229: August 17, 2010

Note To Self...

Don't Be a Bird Brain!

So yes, this is a picture from last week's visit to Malibu.  Because it was "chilly" (perfect weather in my book) there were more seagulls on the tanning cots than people.  

And why are you looking at a week-old photo you ask?  Well, that would be because it is helpful to actually put the battery back in the camera after charging it.  I didn't realize I hadn't done that til I was at a park tonight trying to shoot the ducks.  Sigh.  I'm blaming the stress of the start of a new school year.

Day 228: August 16, 2010

I Wonder Who Lives Here?

Since the weather was glorious (and the humidity was actually low!) I headed to the park this afternoon.  My walk was cut short by the hoards of ravenous mosquitoes, however - one even tried to bite my eyebrow!  I did come across this fungi growing in the hollow of a tree along the path.  It looks just like a real life "fairy door", all decorated with white mushrooms for an awning!

Day 227: August 15, 2010

Underbelly of the Beast

This little guy was hanging on my neighbor's garage today just before a storm blew in.  It's not as sharp as I'd like due to not having the tripod (no time to grab it with the rain starting) and due to the breeze blowing him around a bit.

Day 226: August 14, 2010

Do Not Leave Me Alone With Photo Shop Filters...

OK, so my photo-mojo isn't quite back yet.  I looked around for something to photograph tonight and saw this little bird ocarina I picked up on vacation.  He really is black with white painted bits - which is kind of boring.  So I started messing around with cropping, angles, and filters.  Ahem.  Got a bit carried away but it's always fun to play with the filters in PS and see what they can do.

Day 225: August 13, 2010

Cats!

Today was another long, hectic day.  The cats sort of cooperated for a photo shoot, but my living room lighting leaves a lot to be desired.  This means I have to use a flash which means they blink.  Every time.  So I cropped this one of Wednesday in close and played with some of the artistic filters.

I caught Colby looking a little pensive below.

Day 224: August 12, 2010

Fried/Fry's

I promise this is the last day I post a cheat (at least for a while!).  Jet-lag kicked my butt this am (feeling much better now) and once again, I spent all day prepping my room - still not ready, but getting there.

This is another picture from the last day of my trip - this is the Fry's store in Burbank, CA.  The inside is even weirder - space aliens, giant robots, huge octopus whose arms hold shelves full of TV's, etc...  I did not take the camera inside the store - d'oh!

Day 223: August 11, 2010

Wish I Was Here:

So I didn't take any pictures today - a bit jet-lagged and also spent the entire day at school as I am pretty behind on getting my room ready for next Thursday's start of school.  I took this at Malibu outside Paradise Cove restaurant - the seagull was a surprise - flew across my view just I snapped the pic!

Day 222: August 10, 2010

Airport Oddity

Well, I did manage to take one photo today.  I had a layover of just over two hours at the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport today and this structure was smack in the middle of the concourse near the food court.  There is nothing to see inside of it (I checked) - it just appears to be some sort of artistic statement.  Shrug.  Made for a an interesting picture on an otherwise uninteresting day of travel.

Day 221: August 9, 2010

Rock Lobster!

On the last day of our vacation, we went to Malibu and had lunch at Paradise Cove, which is right on the beach.  There are some tide pools just down the beach from the restaurant and a bunch of kids were having a blast with the lobster-munching sea urchins.  Empty lobster shells were everywhere - one of the kids was more than happy to hold one up for me so I could snap a picture!

Day 220: August 8, 2010

Sunset at Santa Monica

We reached the end of Route 66 in Santa Monica, California.  Whew!  What a ride!  The beach near the Santa Monica Pier wasn't too crowded - water was a bit chillier than Californians are used to apparently.  It felt good on my toes, though!

Tomorrow is a day to bum around the LA area then I fly home on Tuesday.  Tuesday's post may be difficult as I'll be traveling most of the day, but I'll do my best to take a picture somewhere!

Day 219: August 7, 2010

Desert Cows!

Visited my second ever desert today - the Mojave Desert.  It was WINDY!  And not as hot as the Painted Desert was.  Driving out of the National Preserve I spotted this foursome literally on the side of the road.  Some were standing, some were laying down, but all were nomming away on the brush.  By the time we had the car turned around and in position for me to hop out and take this picture, they had all stood up to look at us.  The one on the far left was very spooked by us and bolted pretty quickly.  

So to sum up, what I have learned about deserts is:  1. it rains and 2. they have cows.  Who knew?

Day 218: August 6, 2010

Sunset at the Grand Canyon

Spent the entire day at the Grand Canyon.  Ended with a view of the sun setting from the Watchtower area near the Eastern Entrance to the South Rim.  It was cloudy and threatened rain but the view was spectacular.  I probably have a better shot somewhere amongst the 255 I took today, but after 11 hours at the canyon and an hour drive each way, I'm exhausted! Look for more canyon photos to be up on the travel blog in the coming days.

Day 217: August 5, 2010

Painted Desert

So I went to a desert for the first time in my life.....and it rained.  Seriously. Not the whole time, thankfully, but still!  The painted desert really does live up to it's reputation - stunning views at every turn.  Unfortunately, it was 93F plus humidity and was actually very sunny for most of the drive through the park.  Someday I'd like to come back with better camera equipment and more photography knowledge and a heckuva lot more time!

Day 216: August 4, 2010

Sandia Crest, New Mexico

This is the view from Sandia Crest outside Albuquerque, New Mexico.  We drove up to the top (10, 685 feet) this morning and were rewarded with fantastic views in all directions.  We spent most of today in Albuquerque - but it's late and the Route 66 blog will have to wait until tomorrow!

Day 215: August 3, 2010

Cadillac Ranch

Sorry for the delay in updating - last night's hotel had a bad wireless router and a defunct land line.  

As always, more details on the Route 66 blog.  This is the infamous Cadillac Ranch.  Basically, someone "planted" a row of old cars into a field and allows/encourages people to spray paint them.  It was a bit of a trek from the road back to the cars.  We didn't stick around very long in the 102 degree heat!

Day 214: August 2, 2010

In Memoriam

 

Yet another monolith in the sun.  This time it's a bit more somber, however.  This is part of the Oklahoma City National Memorial.  More on the travel blog.

Day 213: August 1, 2010

Stonehenge

Today's portion of Route 66 took us through Rolla, MO - home of a scale model of Stonehenge! It's set up to be astronomically accurate - complete with an analemma to mark the calendar.  I don't think I've ever before seen a sign saying, "Do not stand on the analemma"!

Day 212: July 31, 2010

Meet Me in St. Louis

Day 2: Joliet, IL to Cuba, MO.  Today was a very full day!  There will be all sorts of details and photos on the trip blog soon - the Internet speed at our current hotel may delay that a day or two, however.

This was my first trip to St. Louis.  (From here on out, every place we go will be a first for me, I think.)  We arrived a bit later than we intended, and after fighting Cardinals fans for parking, walking uphill for about 10 blocks, and waiting in line for a little while, the ranger came out to tell us all the tickets to ride to the top of the arch were sold out for the day.  So we settled for pictures from the outside.

It was very sunny (about 90F and very humid, too) and the sun was starting to set.  This shot looked a lot better in black and white - it was inspired by The Weekend in Black and White - go check them out!

Day 211: July 30, 2010

The Bean

Today we drove to Chicago to start our Route 66 Trip properly. For more details and pics of the trip as it progresses, please see my other blog: HERE.  While I fully intend to update this blog daily, the Route 66 blog may get delayed depending on time available to edit pictures.

This of course is the famous "Bean" sculpture in Millennium Park in downtown Chicago.  It's proper name is Cloud Gate, but it looks like a giant bean.  It reflects everyone and everything around it.  It was a gray, hazy day in Chicago, but the rain held off long enough to get some shots.

Day 210: July 29, 2010

Under Construction

Sorry for the change in url.  I decided to make a bit better use of my domain name and add another blog to it.  That site (http://toledonative.com) will most likely undergo a few more changes along the way - I'm not overly happy with some of the constraints of blogger.  In the mean time, please redirect your bookmarks to this address, or just go to the old one and click on the link for this blog.

This shot was taken a few days ago near my house.  I did not see the Woody (from Toy Story) doll hanging from a makeshift noose until I made the picture big! Can you find it?

Tomorrow morning begins VACATION! Driving Route 66 and flying home from LA (OK, Burbank) on August 10.  Hence the second blog.  I want to blog the trip in more detail than one photo a day allows.  But never fear, I will continue to choose one picture from each day to post here.

Day 209: July 28, 2010

One Thousand Days of Detours

So the Ohio Department of Transportation is undertaking a major project to widen I-475 from roughly my neighborhood to the I-75 split.  Along the way they are eliminating one exit, completely re-doing another so it empties directly into Toledo Hospital, and closing overpasses and exits during construction. 

It is a THREE YEAR project. 

While most exits will only be closed for part of the time, the one on Monroe street apparently is out for the duration.  I'm used to seeing signs like this that say construction will last for 90 days, or 180 days, but 1,000 days really floored me.

This would be bad enough, but all summer long, not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR major roads surrounding my house (OK one is 5 miles away but on my route to work) have been under construction with periodic lane closures and detours.  It's been nearly impossible to get out of my neighborhood without encountering orange barrels.

All of this construction is needed, it's just incredibly inconvenient to have such a convergence of it in my end of town and for such duration.

I have no idea what the graffiti means nor do I know why ODOT uses stick on letters (or are they hand-drawn?) for signs that will be up for three years.  Nor do I know why they cannot manage to hang a sign that is not crooked.  Let's hope their road construction skills are slightly better.

Day 208: July 27, 2010

Titus Flavius

My daughter and I went to the Toledo Museum of Art today.  Photography is only allowed in certain areas and no flash is allowed at all. Which limited my choices of photos for today.  In the ancient art room, I found this bust of Roman Emperor Titus Flavius.  In real life, it's a yellowed marble bust.  I really wasn't happy with the photo but it was the best I had in terms of clarity due to lighting issues.  So I played with it quite a bit in PhotoShop,

Day 207: July 26, 2010

Splendor in the Grass

The inspiration credit for today's shot goes to my daughter.  She grabbed my camera and started shooting today then suddenly she was on her stomach in the grass, shooting away.  I liked where she was going with her shots, so tried it myself.  This is what happens when you don't mow your lawn and it rains a lot - the grass goes to seed! Since our yard is more weeds than actual grass, however, it really doesn't look that terrible...yet.

I couldn't resist playing with this shot in PhotoShop - the result is below.

Day 206: July 25, 2010

Power Lines

As often happens, this is not the shot I set out to take today.  I stopped at a construction site that has a major road near my home shut down for a couple of weeks.  I've passed it every day for a week and said to myself that I need to stop and photograph the two meter diameter concrete pipe sections and giant machines.  Today, I did, as it is Sunday and there were no workers around.  Then on the way back to my car, I looked up at the clouds and saw this confluence of wires crisscrossing the sky. I didn't notice the birds til I got home and looked at the shot on my computer.  For some reason, the lines look wavy when the photo is small - click to make it bigger to see how they really look!

Day 205: July 24, 2010

Dragonfly

While at a family reunion today, I staked out the hummingbird feeder waiting for the hummingbird to come back while I actually had my camera out....he was sneaky and refused to cooperate.  However, this pretty dragonfly landed on the feeder and was very cooperative during his photo shoot!  It was pretty windy, as you can tell by how much his right side wings are bending.  He looks kind of like a dog with goggles to me.  And yes, this is seriously cropped - had only the kit lens again - and no tripod - I have GOT to start traveling with all my gear!

Day 204: July 23, 2010

Cake!

Today was the last day of my summer classes for this year! YAY! We survived! To celebrate, one of my classmates, Elizabeth, made us this gorgeous cake! It was almost too pretty to eat...but we managed.  Yes, she used chocolate fondant and malted milk balls! It was a stunning cake!  Thanks, Elizabeth!

Day 203: July 22, 2010

You're Not Mr. McGregor, Are You?

This little guy reminded me of Peter Rabbit, checking out Mr. McGregor's garden.  The statue is called "The Gardner" and is in a smallish landscaped plot in front of University Hall at UT.  I started shooting the sculpture then noticed this little guy sniffing around.  He was too cute to pass up!

Day 202: July 21, 2010

Circular Reflections

Today, one of my classmates, who teaches at Toledo Technology Academy, brought in his Stirling Engine to show us. It gathers and concentrates the sun's rays and the little doohickey in the center of the dish is the heat collector.  It uses the heat from the sun to run a motor on the back of the dish. It's only about two feet across and is mounted on what looks like a camera tripod.  Despite being just a small-scale model, it was pretty cool! I loved the reflections of the surrounding buildings in the dish.  I did crop out my classmates surrounding the dish to reduce distractions.

Day 201: July 20, 2010

Watering Day

Ok, so Day 201 was actually taken on Day 202.  Yesterday just got away from me.  Despite the promise of rain in the clouds, the university was watering in full-force today.  As you can see from the brown patches, it's been a bit dry around here! 

Day 200: July 19, 2010

Lacy Leaves in Summer

I found myself a little less than inspired on day 200.  Then I looked up.  There are a half dozen large oak trees in my yard and the branches are full of leaves.  The clouds added a bit of interest as well.  With the early evening shadows and cloudy sky, it was nearly monochrome when I started.  A little desaturation really made the patterns pop.

Day 199: July 18, 2010

Sunset on the Maumee

Had to pick up my daughter at Walbridge Park tonight at 9 pm (Zoo Teen picnic).  We had a line of storms move through the area earlier in the evening, and they left behind some gorgeous clouds for the sun to color.  Here are two of my favorites.  Saw some incredibly amazing potential shots on the drive home, but decided it was not safe to stop on an interstate.