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!
Time once again for Senior Sunday! It is Garrett’s turn once again in the rotation.
We took Garrett’s pictures in the southside Ames Racquet and Fitness parking lot on the Sunday of Pufferbilly Days. It was a cloudy day (a win), but it also started raining part of the way through the photo shoot.
Here are some more of my favorites from the photo shoot:
I’ve taken senior pictures with significant other. I’ve taken them with animals. But this was the first time I’ve ever taken them with cycling teammates.
Until next Senior Sunday!
The images in the folder 2009-11-04 are a collection of pictures from a little bit all over the place. The majority of the pictures are from Johnathan’s senior pictures photo shoot. But there are also pictures in there from when I completed Window Project #1 and from when I was modeling a shirt I was given from when I was initiated into a group known as “The Girls”.
I’m not sure if “The Girls” is still a thing, but I still own the shirt. I’m sure it fits a little tight now. I don’t know if it will survive the great clothing purge that is coming, but I give it a fighting chance.
Here are some of my favorite pictures from folder 2009-11-04:
Johnathan invented the fake looking smile. It didn’t exist before him. I’m pretty sure the remnants of Window Project #1 are still in my basement. It fell apart. It might go in the burn pile. I have lots of stuff I’m going to burn when the burn ban gets lifted in Boone. Lots of stuff in that basement are itching for a burnin’.
I tried and failed to change the name of “The Girls” to “The Badass Action Sqaud”. That is perhaps why “The Girls” lasted staying power of a group with a great name. For example, “The Boone County Sea Dogs”.
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 Iowa State football and a rabbit.
30 days working from home in the book. Although for the first time, I had to go into the mine to do something that couldn’t be done from home. I can’t put into words how much I hate Apple products. The fire of a thousands suns. That is the heat of my hatred for Apple products.
There were only 5 people working in the physical mine when I went there. So I actually got to physically see Kim for the first time since March. I also got to physically see Vest because… let me reiterate how much I hate Apple products.
If you are running a business, buy an adult computer.
I’m not sure if I garnered any more positives from working from home this week. But good things did happen. Baier dropped off an order of 60 chicken wings from Buffalo Wild Wings. Took me some time to get through all of those, but I’m not even mad about it. Although it did set back the timeline for a project I’ve been working on, but that is okay. The fishies of the sea are thankful.
I still haven’t started on the basement. For those asking. Instead, I’ve done a bit of yardwork. Maybe I’ll start on the basement this weekend.
I’ve reached track # 1210 “Freak on a Leash” by Korn. Korn is a band I don’t listen to much any more. Not really at all. Was never a big Korn fan, but they were a part of my listening milieu at one point of my life.
“Freak on a Leash” probably isn’t the best song to ingest during physical distancing. Better than drinking bleach or injecting Lysol, but a sample of the lyrics:
“Sometimes I cannot take this place
Sometimes it’s my life I can’t taste
Sometimes I cannot feel my face
You’ll never see me fall from grace”
I did eliminate several songs from the Master Playlist this week though. All of them because the sound quality on them were really low:
#800 “Ironic” by James Corden and Alanis Morissette
#1052 “Tennessee” by Arrested Development
#1053 “Intergalactic” by Beastie Boys
#1054 “So What’Cha Want” by Beastie Boys
#1055 “Sabotage” by Beastie Boys
#1062 “Mama Said Knock You Out” by LL Cool J
#1101 “If I Were A Boy” by BC Jean
Hope to get to the end of the Master Playlist soon so I can start adding music to it.
+++++++
As I have been a cleaning fool, I’ve looked for more and more ways to get Naima’s fur under control. Not the fur on her body, but the fur she leaves everywhere. I have purchased 2 air purifiers. I’m thinking of breaking down and buying a full-sized vacuum cleaner. I haven’t yet, but one thing I did recently breakdown and purchase is the Furzapper.
Furzapper is a product that you throw in your washer and dryer and it zaps the fur on your clothing. It was relatively cheap, so I pulled the trigger and thought I would give it a try.
Wow! Looks great! But do they work? Boy do they!
I started with some gym pants that are by far in the worst shape.
I followed the directions:
In fact, I washed and dried the pants twice. Once alone, and this was the result:
Does that look worse? Cause it look worse to me. So I figured that maybe there were some missing instructions. So here is the complete list of “secret instruction” I discovered.
Step #1: Wash and dry alone.
Step #2: Wash and dry with other clothes.
Step #3: Drive real fast and hold them out the window.
Step #4: Pick off the really big pieces of fur.
Step #5: Run a lint roller over it for 15 minutes.
Step #6: Hang outside on a windy day.
Step #7: Run a lint roller over it again.
Step #8: Drive real fast and hold them out the car window.
Step #9: Wash and dry alone.
After those 9 easy steps, this is the result:
Not perfect, but I can wear them again. In fact, probably wearing them as you read these word!
So if anybody tells you that Furzapper is the worst 15 bucks they ever spent, just tell them about the secret directions that I have uncovered. That is all it takes to make Furzapper appear to work like a champ!
+++++++
Last fall Andy requested that I come to photograph Kyle playing in a Boone High football game. It was the first time I have attended a Boone High Football game since Brandon graduated.
Boone has a super young team and I don’t remember the score, but their opponent, ADM dominated the entire game. I think Boone was lucky to get off the field because I think something like 8 Boone players left the game with injuries. Including a kid that had to be taken off the field in an ambulance in the last minutes of the game.
Here are some picture from the night. Kyle is #30. You will also recognize some photos of Autumn and Taylan:
It was quite the experience, but a tough environment to photograph. At least from the stands. It was so packed in there, could barely move in any direction.
I’m sure, if there is high school football this year, I’ll be at a game again this year.
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.
+++++++
Time to reveal a second collection pictures from the 2019 Howard Family Photo Shoot:
Still plenty more Howards to go!
It is everybody’s favorite day…. SENIOR SUNDAY!!!! Air horn! Air horn! Air horn!
It is back to Taylan’s turn in the rotation. All these pictures were taken on the same half block of downtown Boone. Starting with the Boone First United Methodist Church parking lot.
Lots more Senior Sundays still to come. Lots more.
25 days working from home down. No clue how many are left, but I’m guessing it at least 2 more weeks. This week with my extra stay at home time, I mopped my floors. All of them. Not counting the basement. We don’t talk about the basement! I also cleaned all my blinds. Which was scarier that I thought it would be. But as it turns out, only the bathroom blinds were that scary. The kitchen blinds a little bit. I hope to do a wardrobe downsizing soon. Hopefully this weekend. We’ll see. Maybe, I’ll even start working on the basement. Maybe get a little more yard work done.
My work listening schedule didn’t change much. Streamed Life 107.1 FM from 7-9 in the morning. I had what I’m gong to consider a God Moment on Wednesday morning. I know that listening to a Christian radio station might always be a God Moment, but there is one in particular. After the Coronacat post on Tuesday night, I got my normal heat from “cat people”.
Then on Wednesday morning, Taylor and Jen (the morning hosts on Life 107.1) were interviewing the lead singer of Casting Crowns. He is was well studied theologian. For what may have seemed like no reason, he announced that “cats don’t have souls”. Then he went on to praise golden retrievers. Sorry, Alisa, them’s the facts.
I went to Amazon and immediately ordered “Thrive”, “Until the Whole World Hears”, “The Very Next Thing” and “Only Jesus”.(They will arrive promptly on May 15) I’m not a new Casting Crowns fan. “Nobody” is a flat out banger that I sometimes listen to on a loop.
Of course, this will be used to support the false narrative that I hate cats. Not true. I just report facts.
It is like Harry Truman said:
“I never did give them hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.”
Then from 9 to 2 I listen to the Master Playlist. This week I made it all the way to track #1002 – “I Don’t Want to Be” by Gavin DeGraw. Probably a good song for quarantine living:
“I don’t want to be anything
Other than what I’ve been trying to be lately
All I have to do is of me and I have peace of mind
I’m tired of looking around rooms wondering what I gotta do
Or who I’m supposed to be
I don’t want to be anything other than me”
I didn’t eliminate any songs from the Master Playlist this week.
From 2-4 I still listen to Murph & Andy. Although this week I sprinkled in a podcast breaking down Iowa State’s 2020 football roster.
I don’t know if I’ve discovered any more positives with the work from home life. I recently purchased two air purifiers. I’m not sure it has kept the dust homes as much as I wanted, but I can definitely tell the air is cleaner because I could tell that Naima was really starting to get ripe. She got a bath on Wednesday night. She wasn’t a fan, but she is crazy soft right now.
+++++++
Pastor Dave reached out to me on Wednesday and wanted me to write up (or make a video) of how I’ve seen God working recently. I’m not sure how he is going to use it, but I think he will using during our church service on Sunday. Which you can hear live on KWBG at 9 AM. We still aren’t having worship services in person, obviously.
You can also stream KWBG from their website.
I went the written route because if I started making a video, it would take forever. Absolutely forever. I get too deep into those things.
+++++++
Time to start curating a collection of pictures that I’m just going to lump under the category of Elainie Homecoming. These were taken back in September when Elainie was home from San Diego. Some are family portrait type pictures. Some are more like Elainie-Sabas engagement photos.
Here is the first collection:
There is a ton more photos from Elainie’s homecoming on the way. A veritable ton!
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.
I’ve finally got around to sharing pictures of my great-nephew Kanoa. He was born late last August and he is so cute that I wanted to keep all his pictures to myself. But I can’t keep all the cuteness to myself. What is the old saying, “Cuteness held is the seed; Cuteness shared is the flower.”
Here is cuteness shared:
If you are wondering why there aren’t any pictures of Carla and Jason here, they weren’t there. They were off doing grandparent type things.
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.”
+++++++
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.
