I’ve been working on the Friends Album in the Snapshots Gallery lately. I’ve added close to 100 new photos of friends.
If you would like to check those new photos out, just follow the link:
Also, I would remind you that if you “Register” to become a “User” in the Galleries, you can do some cool things like “Favorite” pictures, “Comment” on pictures or “Rate” pictures.
Saturday was the final home game for the Cyclones. I don’t have many pictures because low light and cold temperatures do not make for ideal photographic conditions.
Jesse and his reversible hat.
Faust and his beverage.
Ames Party Bus
Senior Day
Joe
Cheerleader
ISUCFVMB Senior Tradition
Moon
Arnaud
Jack Trice Stadium
There are more pictures in the ISU vs. Missouri album in the Snapshots Gallery:
Here are a couple of special effect pictures of Brandon and a frame.
I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that Brandon is wearing the tie I wore in Jen and Derrick’s wedding this summer.
This is a collection of a few of the color images from Day 1 of Brandon’s Senior Photo Shoot.
These probably aren’t the best pictures from the day, but they are some of my favorites.
Perhaps this is more a collection of goofy looks on his face, but they are my favorite goofy looks.
Shannon had over a foot of hair cut off her head last Thursday. On Sunday I was able to document this joyous hair loss, but the day was not completely happy.
In the picture above you should try to look past Shannon. You may notice something. Shannon appears to be standing on an abandoned railroad bridge.
My favorite park in Ames is Brookside Park. I don’t believe I would be talking out of turn if I were to guess that it is also Shannon’s favorite park. We met at the park and walked to this bridge despite the cold temperatures.
The previous Saturday we met there to take her before pictures. We talked about going to this bridge on that day because she was curious about it. She had heard a wildly inaccurate characterization of the bridge from Becky. Becky and I had walked across the bridge one night after a Jaycees meeting.
On that Saturday there must have been about 20 people just hanging out on the bridge. I thought we should give the bridge another try, but it did not end up to be one of my better ideas.
If you take you gaze downward you might notice a few things about Shannon. I mentioned it was cold. The proof can be found in the coat/scarf combination that she was wearing. Although it is stylish, the gloves she is wearing are not for fashion purposes. Shannon was cold.
The particularly observant might notice a couple of other things. In her gloved hands Shannon appears to be holding a bag. The bag contains the hair that Shannon parted with so that she could make a donation to Locks of Love.
If you know this bridge very well, you might be able to gather from the trees behind Shannon, she is standing over water.
I’m sure you can see what is coming, but on this day I did not. When Shannon reached into the bag to pull out her former hair to pose for a picture with it, one of the 8 braids (I have no clue if that is the right word) escaped her stylishly gloved, but frozen hands.
It fell between two railroad ties and into the ice cold stream below.
It was a heart breaker. I didn’t think Shannon would want this to be documented, but she insisted that it be documented.
We managed to get the rest of her former hair put away and left that cursed bridge.
Once we got to dryish land we took some pictures of the her and her former hair.
I repeat. That is lots of hair.
The lost hair didn’t take off down the stream immediately. There was some time where it seemed like it might possibly wash near enough to the bank that we could get to it with out descending deep into the near freezing water.
But it was not to be.
The day was not a complete loss though. There are still 7 locks to be sent to Locks of Love. A wonderful donation.
I also gave this beanie to Shannon. I hate to part with anything that Teresa makes, but I don’t think the colors are for me. Everybody seems to say that the hat looks better on her than me any way. It is probably because it is hard for me to give the badass vibe that I normally emanate when I’m wearing that beanie.
After the photo shoot Shannon helped me to write a CPG for the Ames Jaycee website that I redesigned. I won’t bore you with the details, if you aren’t a Jaycee you really wouldn’t be that interested.
Then we joined my Mom, Carla and Teresa for supper at Jeff’s Pizza. If I haven’t written about it before, I love Jeff’s Pizza. I’m a particularly large fan of their Gyro Guy pizza and their Clones. Clones are pizza rolls and they are fantastic. Better than Gumby’s used to make before Gumby’s went terribly downhill.
The meal was pleasant despite the fact that the large amount of females at the table insisted on ordering a Chicken Alfredo pizza. I’m going to tell you flat out, chicken does not belong on a pizza. Even the gourmet pizza wizards at Jeff’s Pizza could not sway my opinion. I will freely confess that their Chicken Alfredo pizza was the best chicken pizza I have had to date, but it still wasn’t a pizza I would want to sit down and take to town.
Thankfully, we ordered a Gyro Guy pizza as well, so I didn’t wither away.
The conversation was relatively polite until it inevitably turned into gossip hour about my friends. I was able to put the smack down on that though. We gossiped about Teresa’s friends instead.
Truth be known, I don’t gossip.
After dinner Shannon and I went to Stephens to see the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra. It was the first professional symphony orchestra concert I have ever attended. They played 3 pieces of music including a piece by Bernstein and a piece by Copland.
The lights never fully dimmed. This was something I wasn’t expecting. Another thing I found odd was that they opened the show by playing the Star Spangled Banner. I’ve gotten to the point where I only hear the National Anthem at sporting events, so that was a nice little surprise. They followed the Star Spangled Banner with the playing of what I’m going to assume was the Israeli National Anthem.
They concluded the show by playing two encores. Before the encores the conductor of the Symphony Orchestra spoke to the crowd and praised people from Iowa. I guess that was the classical music equivalent of “You rock Ames, Iowa! We wish we could take you with us.”
It was a very enjoyable show. I will gladly go see a Symphony Orchestra concert again in the future.
So the night ended on a high after the low of losing the hair. An excellent day at the aggregate level!
Shannon is getting ready to make her third donation to Locks of Love. She is getting her hair cut on Thursday. We went to Brookside Park and documented what she looked like now. There will be an after coming up at some point.
This is where Shannon found a stray cat a couple weeks ago. A cat that almost became friends with Franklin.
More of the cat tale.
She is getting something like 12-13 inches taken off. I’m excited to see how this turns out.
I had a pretty good Halloween.
I hosted FNSC. I made chili. I made cornbread from scratch. I made apple cider. Jay made a blueberry buckle. Willy showed up in a costume. We watched some movies from a bygone era that some people might characterize as strange. However, I think I might have found proof that rabbits will jump off a table in one of these movies. A classic from the 1970s known as Night of the Lepus. A phenomenal movie.
I can not compete with Jay, so I made a stick figure to accent the disparity between our pumpkin carving skills. This annoyed Jay for some reason. I don’t often do things out of spite, but I might have to make the stick figure my annual pumpkin because it both annoys Jay and because the simple stick figure grew on me as the night went on. I don’t think it was just the apple cider impairing my judgment either.
The candles in Jay’s pumpkin.
Scott and Austin; Unfortunately I didn’t get a picture of the Howard kids or the Davis clan. I’m going to get that done next year.
Jay carving his second pumpkin.
I had to buy a new flash recently because, well I don’t want to get into that story. This might have been one of those blessing in disguise type things. I really like my new flash.
Although I’ve gotten glowing feedback on my Cider, chili, little smokies and cornbread, I think I’m going to have to research a new recipe for pumpkin seeds before next year. They take a decent picture at least.
I think if Willy dressed like this every week, he would be irresistible to the womanfolk. He probably already is though.
I also didn’t get a picture of Alexis this year. I think she kind of phoned it in any way. She went to school dressed like Hannah Montana, but she showed up for trick-or-treating in her gymnastics outfit.
The best part about Alexis showing up was that she didn’t even ring the doorbell. She just walked right in with her friends and said:
“Where’s the candy?”
She was showing off for her friends just a little bit.
On Thursday Jesse and I moved some furniture around. Later in the afternoon we went to check out the frisbee golf course in McHose.
I had heard rumors about this course for quite some time. But I had only seen 1 or 2 holes. Jesse and I decided to find every last hole on Thursday. It came as somewhat of a surprise when it took us almost 3 hours to find all 18.
It was a pleasant surprise to find out how dangerous some of them were to get to.
Note the perfect frisbee form.
Jesse
I believe that multitasking is just a fancy way of saying: “Look at me. I’m not doing anything well.” However, I did make a fantastic throw and schedule a pickup of my broken kitchen cabinet for repair at the same time. However, I somehow feel like I could have done both better.
A good looking throw.
The best throw of the day.
Look at the concentration on Jesse’s face.
I thought disc golf was a stoner’s game?
Jesse making crossing the stream look much tougher than it really is, but still I’m impressed that you have to cross the stream via a bunch of broken up concrete blocks. Not a course for the faint of heart.
I managed to find a nice patch of mud hidden underneath some leaves.
A dangerous bridge. Most of the railing is missing. The bridge shakes like crazy. I love every bit of it.
Another dubious bridge. Awesome.
You fall. You get wet.
I admit that I’ve always dismissed disc golf as a stoner sports meant to occupy the time of stoners in between discussing the best Dave Matthews album and waiting for the munchies, but this course may have changed my mind. At least holes 3-11 are pretty intense. You have to cross the stream multiple times in ways that your safety is in question. I love that. The Boone park system has slowly been taking away fun things since my youth because they have been deemed dangerous. Tornado slides. The cable bridge. The tire climb. Merry-go-rounds. This course definitely has some aspects of danger that are missing from most of McHose Park.
I still miss the tornado slides though.
I spent most of Monday with Sara.
We started the day by lunching at Fresh Cafe and Market. It is an interesting little restaurant in West Des Moines that is only open about 20 hours a week. They specialize in serving an organic menu.
We started the meal with a double shot of wheat grass. I’m not big into wheat grass, but Sara has made me curious about it. This was the fourth different type of wheat grass that I have tried with her. This was also the best. It was a healthy boost that was most likely negated by our supper.
Sara ordered the Hummus & Veggie Wrap.
I ordered the Mediteranian Wrap. I assume that there is a reason why they spell it that way. I chose the spinach tortilla. The wrap consisted of organic greens, fresh veggies, black and green seasoned olives, tomatoes, feta, lemon and olive oil. It was quite excellent.
At the conclusion of the meal we hopped in her car to travel to Ottumwa to visit Jen.
We stopped at a gas station in Oskaloosa to get candy. Sara was very high on Big League Chew.
Sara was very high on this sucker that reminded her of the Ogden swimming pool.
Bailey
Bailey
Bailey and a neighborhood dog
Derrick,Sara and Jen
Jackson and a neighborhood dog
Derrick’s Chainsaw Sculpture
This mullet wig would be part of a Halloween costume, if I were to dress up.
This was my first time ever in Ottumwa. It is a town that seems to be fading out of existence, but there are a few nice touches.
In downtown Ottumwa there is an “Adult” Theater. Two storefronts down is a Christian outreach ministry.
We had supper at the Sirloin Stockade. The Sirloin Stockade is kind of a low rent Golden Corral or Bonanza, but it is also considered the best restaurant in Ottumwa.
Before we got out of the car Derrick made a dramatic announcement.
“At some point during the meal they are going ask you if you want a baked potato. The answer to this question is ‘yes’.”
“Why is that? Is the baked potato the best part of the meal?”
“No. But they won’t stop harassing you about the potato until you take it.”
I took the advice to heart.
Our waitress asked us if we wanted a potato.
“Yes, I want that potato.”
Then Derrick, Jen and Sara all turned down the potato.
“What the heck? You told me to take the potato and then you turn it down.”
Derrick answered, “I didn’t want the potato.”
It was the closest to a Willy moment that I’ve ever had with Derrick.
For the record, they never asked the rest of my party if they wanted a potato again AND the potato was the best part of the meal.
Today is Nader’s Birthday.
Happy Birthday!