This is the last collection of random pictures from 2019. Everything else that is left in the 2019 backlog belongs to a collection of pictures. Such as family portraits or senior pictures or a wedding.
Enjoy:
I can almost see the light at the end of the 2019 backlog. But there is still a ton of photos to go. WooHoo!
Day 4 of the road trip was a grind. We left Orlando and drove for like 15 hours to get back to Kuttawa, Kentucky.
The only real stop we made was a fancypants gas station in Georgia that sold pecans. I kinda thought the pecans down there would be cheaper and maybe they are, but they were still crazy expensive. But I’m not a pecan expert.
The hotel we stayed at had a sweet aquarium.
Attached to their phones. Worse than traveling with teenagers.
Crane in the hotel parking lot.
Bikers?
I got so many yard decorating ideas from this place!
Damn right we hit another Zaxby’s!
Good night from Kentucky.
This wasn’t my style of road trip. I like to be able to stop at random things and meander and photograph. I hope this year’s bowl trip is either closer (I already know it will be in a better city) or I’m able to space it out over a longer time frame. Otherwise, flying might be the way to go.
I would love to go back to Memphis, but there are a lot of people laying down some pretty high expectations for Iowa State this season. I think it will depend on how well the offensive line comes together though.
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This is your reminder that this week’s THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is TREE:
A TREE image is any image that involves a TREE or a TREE byproduct.
Happy photo harvesting!
One of the products of all this home times is that I have started up on THE CANVAS WALL PROJECT again. What started as the accent wall in my living room and then turned into the Friend Wall and then became the 9 Emotions Project wall, was turned into the Canvas Wall about 2 years ago. The ultimate goal is to cover at least 95% of the wall with canvas photos.
I recently added 7 more canvases to the wall. These are all smaller canvases that are meant to fill around the doorway that leads to my hallway.
Here are the 7 canvases that have recently been added:
The pictures that have been selected for THE CANVAS WALL PROJECT are meant to be a combination of every day life pictures and my more artistic pictures.
I’m getting pretty close to the bottom of the wall now. The next collection of pictured added to the wall are definitely obstructed, but that is okay. It matter less that they can be seen, and more that they are there.
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Time to reveal a second collection pictures from the 2019 Howard Family Photo Shoot:
Still plenty more Howards to go!
After the game we went back to the hotel and took a nap. Well some of us took a nap. Some of us might have scrolled through Cyclone Twitter while everybody else napped.
Once the batteries were recharged, we went to a Brazilian Steakhouse that Jorge knew about. It was ridiculously cheap and made cheaper because Dre had found some coupons for it. It cost us like only $30 to eat there. Plus, I think it was the best Brazilian Steakhouse I’ve ever eaten at.
After the meal we parted ways with Andree and his brother and went out on my personal, very personal quest. We had been in Florida for about 24 hours and I still hadn’t seen an alligator.
There was a couple miniature golf courses that claimed to have alligators that we drove past on the way to supper. We drove back there, got some ice cream and checked them out.
The first miniature golf course alligators were kinda sad. They clearly weren’t well cared for and the water was filthy.
At the second miniature golf course we met Joshua and we got to hold an alligator. That place was awesome! It was clean and the gators were clearly loved. For a brief period of time I thought Orlando wasn’t so bad.
Just kidding! Orlando is the worst!
Here is the rest of the pictures I took hanging out on the most beautiful campus in the world with with a couple swans as my only company.
I haven’t been to Ames since I started working from home. One of the things I look forward to is visiting the beautiful Iowa State campus in the future.
Here is the second collection of pictures of flowers I took at the Iowa State Fair on the last day of the Iowa State Fair. Almost all of these were taken in the Discovery Garden. The last one was taken near Pioneer Hall.
I see more than a couple potential future photo contest entries or calendar pages or additions to THE CANVAS WALL PROJECT in this collection. Hopefully there is an Iowa State Fair or a Boone County Fair or Pufferbilly Days to have a contest. At the very least THE CANVAS WALL PROJECT isn’t going anywhere.
I need to start this post with warning you that if you are the type of fool that believes the false narrative that I hate cats, then you will want to turn back now! You will surely misinterpret what lies below to be anti-cat propaganda. It is not anti-cat propaganda. It is pro-public health propaganda. For the record, I agree with Orwell’s assertion that all art is propaganda. Don’t misinterpret this art as anything but pro-public health propaganda.
I feel like I should do a little bit better job documenting my cleaning. However, most of my cleaning is already done, unless you want to discuss the basement. I don’t want to discuss the basement. Why did you bring the basement up?
Last week I completed two minor, but majorly annoying cleaning projects. One was cleaning out my cupboard of all expired food. I didn’t realize that would mean pretty much throwing away everything thing that was in my cupboard. I suppose I should have.
I had lasagna noodle that expired in 2011. A bread mix that expired in 2013. I didn’t buy many groceries before this pandemic. I won’t be buying much to restock my cupboard. I clearly don’t use what I bought in the past, so replacing it would be throwing good money after bad.
I took a couple pictures though:
This is what the cupboard looks like now.
The other major, but minor thing I accomplished was getting rid of all my empty pop cans. I only drink pop once a week now, so I don’t produce a ton of empty cans, yet somehow my giant garbage can dedicated to empty cans had overflowed a long time ago. The recent winds have blown empty cans all over the yard.
Here is my dichotomy. I fully support the can deposit program. Have you ever been to a state that doesn’t have a can deposit program? Trust me. Tennessee is filthy. It makes Missouri look like Minnesota.
The other side of that coin is that I hate taking my cans in. As far as I know, Boone closed its can redemption center years ago. Taking it to Walmart is scarier than any abandoned rest area horror movie you’ve ever seen. The people there. Terrifying.
Plus the smell! The smell is absolutely unbelievable. Not in a good way. Not in the I can’t believe it’s not butter, kind of way. I would describe the smell as high fructose corn syrup and skunk.
And, it gets worse, everything is sticky. A deep sticky too. A deep sticky that makes you wonder if this is just dried up sugar.
You can see the bind I was in, and then the answer came to me out of thin air. Then landed in my cell phone in the form of a text message.
My inside guy (who shall remain nameless to protect their identity because I know that people who own cats suffer from a wide range of mental maladies) texted me to tell me that the fact that cats can get the coronavirus puts the future of the Community Cat Program in danger.
I have long been an opponent of the repugnant Community Cat Program in Boone. Mostly because having cats in the neighborhood lowers your property value. I didn’t buy this house to have Johnny 3 Cat move in next door and drop the value of my house 15%.
I certainly don’t need a cat strolling around my neighborhood on the government dime doing the same thing.
The text jogged something loose in mind. The Boone Area Humane Society has a spot where they accept cans to help fund their activities. I could drop my cans off there!
However, I wanted to make sure they knew that my generous donation of maybe 7 bucks didn’t got to the Community Cat Program, which now, due to cats being able to contract the coronavirus, is a matter of public health safety.
So I made a graphic called Coronacat-Banned:
I printed 3 of them out and taped them to my 3 bags of cans to make it was clear that the money raised from these cans are not to be used to supported the Community Coronacat Program:
It is a matter of public health safety. I’m sure they will have no problem deciphering my graphic.
Remember, “All art is propaganda; the other hand; not all propaganda is art.”
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This collection from the 2019 backlog are from pictures I took around Lake LaVerne.
I have one more swan collection from this day spent on the most beautiful campus in the entire world.
I’ve finally hit the point in the backlog where I am emotionally, spiritually, physically, and psychologically prepared to start curating pictures of flowers from the Iowa State Fair.
It is known that one of my favorite places at the Iowa State Fair is the Discovery Garden. I have to spend at least a couple hours there every year. In fact, here is my power rankings of my 5 favorite places at the Iowa State Fair:
#5. The Avenue of the Breeds
#4. Pioneer Hall
#3. Cultural Center
#2. DNR Building
#1. Discovery Garden
#5 is because Shorty used to take his Scottish Highland cows there. #4 is because my parents used to volunteer there. #3 is because that is where the Photography Salon is located and also because the cheapest Pepsi refills are in the courtyard. #2. Is because it is one of my favorite places to photograph. #1 is because it is my favorite place to photograph.
This list is off the top of my head. I’m sure if I considered the list longer, some of these would be shuffled. Others might be added, like the Animal Learning Center, Heritage Village, 4-H Building, or the Big Boar.
However, I’m pretty sure no matter how many times I made the list, the Discovery Garden would almost always be #1.
Here is the first of two collections of flower pictures from the 2019 Iowa State Fair:
The first few pictures were taken inside the Agriculture Building. The rest were taken in the Discovery Garden.
There is a diverse collection of images in the folder 2009-10-31. Some of the pictures are from when I went tenderloining with the Defeneffes to Goldie’s Ice Cream Shoppe in Prairie City. Some are from when I used to have people I actually know trick-or-treat at my house. The rest are from when I was dog sitting Sara’s pooch Jupiter.
Have a look:
By adding these pictures to the Photography 139 Gallery, I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entries to their original glory:
Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve Johnathan.
Delving into the 2019 backlog. This is a collection of pictures that span a couple different trips to Dickcissel Park with Naima. Most of the pictures are from the second trip where we encountered a wounded goose.
The goose had been injured some way above its leg. It was out there for a couple more days, but then it was gone. I’d like to think that it recovered enough and eventually flew off. I didn’t find any signs of a struggle or goose remains any way and every time I saw the goose, it was hunkered down in the same location.
While there is a fair chance it eventually became victim of a predator, it did have a pretty good system of working its way out onto the pond on the thin ice. Too thin for a creature that weighed much more than it to get to it.
Here are some pictures:
This is a meaningless statistic, but it is a huge milestone for the backlog. I am now down to two rows of folders to curate!
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A reminder that this week’s THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is EARS:
An EARS photo is any picture that involves EARS or things that are used by EARS.
Happy photo harvesting!
