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Here and There…Now and Then |
Pork Chop, Tomato, Rice and Beans, Peas
Dad would say, “two legumes.” Not that there is anything wrong with two legumes. It would just be a comment.
I didn’t take a lot of pictures today and I thought two car pictures so close together might bore some people so here’s something very different, if equally boring. This is what I whipped up for dinner this evening. The peas were a bit overcooked but still go. Cooked tomatoes are a family favorite and go well with the chop.
Jaguar XJ
Actually, I don’t know if this in an XJ or some other model but it looks a bit like the XJ so that’s what I will label it. If you know better, please let me know.
Like the two Maseratis that I see parked in my office parking lot, I believe the owner of this car works in the law firm on the ground floor. I try not to park my car near any of these because it might get an inferiority complex. Another nice ride.
Update — 08/07/2012 — I looked on the back of the car and it is an XF, not an XJ.
Maserati GranTurismo
This is one of two Maseratis that are parked in my office parking lot from time to time. I thought perhaps they were owned by the same person because I hadn’t seen them there together until a few weeks ago, when they were parked next to each other. So, I guess there are two different owners. I like the color of the blue one but this two-door model is nicer over all.
Crushed Car, Close Call
I was driving home yesterday and noticed this downed tree. It’s only about 8 blocks from our house but I hadn’t been this way since before last week’s storm. As you can see, the car is finished. What’s amazing, though, is how close the tree is to the house and how little damage there is. To the left of this, there is a bit of house that sticks out to the front and the tree is less than two feet from it. From what I could see, though, there was not serious damage at all.
The neighbor happened to be outside and I chatted with her briefly. Apparently no one was home at the time, so no one was hurt, which is the most important thing. She commented that it would probably be a long time before anyone got to this. Later in the day I went by again and to my surprise, there was a crew working on the tree, about half of which had already been removed. I was able to confirm that there was literally no visible damage to the house. Amazing.
Weaving Lights
I was pretty absorbed in work today and didn’t get out to take any pictures. On the other hand, I got a lot done. This evening when I picked up Dorothy from Driver’s Ed I was messing about with long exposures of car lights. This is my favorite of the bunch. Not terribly exciting but I’m supposed to be taking pictures and it’s a picture.
Downed Power Lines
The lack of posts here hasn’t actually been to lack of electricity. Our power went out for about 30 seconds and flickered pretty severely for about another minute but that was it. So, we were among the fortunate. When I looked out in the back yard, I expected to see lots of branches down but there was very little and nothing bigger than about an inch in diameter. At that point I thought the storm wasn’t as bad as it sounded, which was pretty ferocious.
When we went out, however, we didn’t have to go far before we saw a little more of the extent of what had happened. Just getting out of our neighborhood took a little doing. Traffic lights were out all over so I figured it was better to stay off the main roads as long as possible. Of course that meant negotiating fallen trees, some of which closed roads off altogether. This is a few blocks from our house but it is a scene that was repeated all over the area.
108°F / 42°C
It isn’t particularly original, I know, but this was pretty much the story for today. Obviously this isn’t the official temperature, it wasn’t really this hot except over black paving that was in the sun all day. On the other hand, this was at about 5:00 PM. It actually read 110°F at one point but I wasn’t going to try to take a picture while moving. The air conditioner in my car barely keeps up in 90°F heat, so it was only marginally cooler in the car on the way home this evening.
I have friends living in a part of Africa where it sometimes cools off to this temperature at night. Still, for those of us used to a temperate climate, this is extreme and not very comfortable. I’m very thankful for air conditioning.
Office Reflections
I like the reflections in my office building. I know I’ve posted them before but they seem to look a little different from day to day and particularly from month to month. Here’s what they look like now. Nice and green and shady. Of course, at 9:00 AM it was already close to 90°F so it’s not as pleasant as it might be. Still, better in the shade than in the sun.
Garden Art
It doesn’t have to be a Renaissance sculpture to qualify as garden art. Here, with a couple pieces of stone, a metal pole for hanging plants, and a plastic dinosaur head, we have a whimsical creation to attract you attention and provide a focal point to the garden.
I’m pretty sure this is a work by David Cudney. It had fallen over and when I picked it up and reset it in the ground about a million ants crawled out of the dinosaur head. They were not happy. Apparently they appreciate art in a different way to us.
Reflections
I am really fascinated by reflections but they are surprisingly hard to turn into good pictures. There are some that are reasonably easy, a glass building or even trees and the sky reflected on a clean and shiny car. Puddles are a bit harder, I find. It rained quite hard today and there was a fair amount of water on the parking lot at work. This picture was taken looking almost straight down. The dark area is actually a reflection of me. I think of it more as an abstract, though, a pattern of light and dark and texture.
Congratulations Garduates!
Caption Contest…
Bass Guitar
Sometimes you have to stop and get back to basics. That is, to the basis of this whole blogging experiment. So, what’s more basic than a bass? I guess I could have gone fishing.
Glass Bricks
These are glass bricks that form a divider in the local Cheeburger Cheeburger. I like the patterns in them, which are given depth by the light coming from outside as well as the colored interior lighting.
Briggs and Stratton
When we moved into out current house in 2006 I decided it was time to retire the lawn mower we had been using at our old house. It was 12 years old and had served faithfully with very little trouble. For the new mower, I thought I’d try a Toro. I can’t say I’m particularly impressed. The engine itself hasn’t had any trouble and I hate to say it’s time for a new one but the rest of the mower could be more robust. The drive transaxle gave up a few years ago. I bought a new one and replaced it and I thought that was going to be the worst of things. Well, a few short years later and it looks like it’s gone again. I don’t really want to keep replacing that. Also, now the bolt the holds the handle to the chassis has come out and disappeared somewhere in the yard. So, I decided to cut my losses and start over. I’m sure there are other people with stories exactly opposite to mine but I’ve gone back to Craftsman. Sorry Toro.
Air Ducts As Art
OK, maybe art is too strong a word here. Perhaps air ducts as design elements. Anyway, I went out to lunch with a couple friends from work today and noticed the nicely painted air ducts overhead. Anyone know where this is?
Potomac Hunt Races
Were were invited by our good friends, the Glenns, to come to the Potomac Hunt Races today. The weather was wonderful and the horses were fast. Actually, I have no idea how they compare to any other horses. We aren’t really in the horsey set and I don’t think I’m often described as being racy. Anyway, we enjoyed sitting in the shade of the canopy and eating a nice picnic lunch with friends. It’s always nice to see them and we don’t as often as we’d like. Little Elsie and Benton are certainly growing and are as cute as ever. We also met the Elkans, a name we’ve heard but never had faces to associate.
Potomac Hunt Races
I was able to get some nice action shots showing the horses with all four feet off the ground. Of course I was trying to blur them, so I used a much slower shutter speed than I could have done. Photographic technology has come a little way in the last 140 years, I’d say.
From Wikipedia: In 1872, the former governor of California Leland Stanford, a businessman and race-horse owner, hired Eadweard Muybridge for some photographic studies. He had taken a position on a popularly-debated question of the day — whether all four feet of a horse were off the ground at the same time while trotting. The same question had arisen about the actions of horses during a gallop. The human eye could not break down the action at the quick gaits of the trot and gallop. Up until this time, most artists painted horses at a trot with one foot always on the ground; and at a full gallop with the front legs extended forward and the hind legs extended to the rear, and all feet off the ground. Stanford sided with the assertion of “unsupported transit” in the trot and gallop, and decided to have it proven scientifically. Stanford sought out Muybridge and hired him to settle the question.
Potomac Hunt Races
In 1872, Muybridge settled Stanford’s question with a single photographic negative showing his Standardbred trotting horse Occident airborne at the trot. This negative was lost, but the image survives through woodcuts made at the time (the technology for printed reproductions of photographs was still being developed). He later did additional studies, as well as improving his camera for quicker shutter speed and faster film emulsions. By 1878, spurred on by Stanford to expand the experiments, Muybridge had successfully photographed a horse at a trot; lantern slides have survived of this later work. Scientific American was among the publications at the time that carried reports of Muybridge’s groundbreaking images.
Maple Leaf
It’s like fall color in the spring. This little maple leaf was on the ground in our back yard and I liked the color when the sun shone through it. Needless to say, I had my camera with me so I took a picture. What a beautiful day.
Ghost Car
It isn’t a great picture but I never promised great pictures. I was waiting at a light on the way home and decided to see if I could get a good blur from the cars going across in front of me. If I had taken this picture about a half a second later I’d have gotten a police car with its lights flashing. Oh well.
I also took some pictures of Dorothy and some of her friends but I’ll post a couple of those on Facebook for those of you who see my pictures there.
Diner
We had dinner with Cathy’s mom at a Thai restaurant this evening, beating the Mother’s Day rush. I really like the lighting, the colors, and the chrome of this diner a couple doors up, though. It isn’t an old or historic diner and in fact it just changed ownership. Still, it looks pretty cool.
Kendra's Trumpet
Dorothy’s friend Kendra came over this evening and played music together, Dorothy on the piano and Kendra on her trumpet. They weren’t tuned together very well but other than that it was nice. Dorothy’s writing a song and they worked out a trumpet part.