Category Archives: Self-Portrait

Self-Portrait, Still Life, Tenderloining, Teresa

Tenderloin Trail 2.0 – Bradford Field Work

October 8, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

A few months back, Teresa and I went to the Stanhope Watermelon Day. After watching the parade we left for a bit to get lunch in Bradford at The Stumble Inn. The Stumble Inn in on the Tenderloin Trail 2.0. It was the Runner-Up for Iowa’s Best Pork Tenderloin in 2019.

Here are some pictures from the meal:

The Crispy Pig is their tenderloin.

Teresa’s Grilled Tenderloin

The short answer is, this was an excellent tenderloin! One of my favorites I’ve ever had. Good breading. Good thickness. Toasted bun. They served Pepsi. The onion rings were phenomenal.

On a scale, of would I go avoid this place to would I pursue it, I would definitely pursue this tenderloin!

In fact, one of the few reasons I haven’t had this tenderloin again is because there are so many other tenderloins out there that I need to try. Including at least a few more from Tenderloin Trail 2.0 to this years finalists for Best Tenderloin to the 2022 Best Tenderloin Winner. But I will have this tenderloin again someday!

Also, the meal comes with a complimentary homemade mint, which was also delicious.

Next Sunday’s food adventure will involve a food truck at the Boone County Fair.

Animals, Black & White, Faust, Fisheye, Flowers, Football, Iowa State, Lensbaby, Music, Naima, Nature, Self-Portrait, Street Photography, WPC - Alternate

But You Broke Much More Than That

September 30, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

I took a ton of pictures on Saturday that are alternates for the BLACK & WHITE theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. So buckle up, this is going to be a long post. Even though most of these images can be broken into two different events.

1. Trip to Jester Park.
2. Iowa State football game.

No reason to keep dinking around. Here are the images from last Saturday:

I believe this is the 1st time I’ve seen Faust since before the pandemic. That is a damn shame!

Jester Park

I didn’t tailgate for the game on Saturday. Derrick and I got to stadium in time to catch the end of the warmups. I took in a cheap point & shoot I bought at a computer mine auction several years ago. I haven’t fired pixels through it in over 4 years. I didn’t take many game pictures for a variety of reasons, but I took plenty of pictures of the things that surround the game.

I love that they still use the Twitter logo. F Elon Musk.

I think it was a pretty good to great day!

Only one more pretty big sized collection of black & white images before we return to our normal broadcast schedule.

Animals, Art, Black & White, Candid Portrait, Flowers, Macro, Naima, Nature, Railroad, Self-Portrait, Still Life, Street Photography, Vest, Work

About Someone Who Loved You More

September 27, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

This collection of alternate images for last week’s theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE will include pictures I took on Wednesday and Thursday of last week. Most of them I took on my lunch break from the computer mine on Wednesday. I went to downtown Ames to talk to Derrick about the upcoming football game on Saturday, but he was actually at the bank. So I did wander around a little bit and do some street photography.

I got stuck working late yet again on Wednesday night, so I didn’t take many pictures in the evening.

Here is the collection of images from Wednesday:

On Thursday I woke up to a foggy morning. I had to work at the Computer Mine worldwide headquarters. So I snapped some pictures on the way there. Then I snapped a few pictures at work and then did some shopping after work. Then took a few more when I got home.

Here are the Thursday pictures:

A lot of examples in this collection for why I love black & white photography so much. Or one of the reasons. There is just so much play in the exposure control that you get with black & white that you don’t get with color photography. Which isn’t to say that it is less demanding, because if anything, it can be more demanding. However, there is so much latitude in exposure and some of the things that can destroy a color photo like grain (or digital noise) can actually enhance a black & white image.

4 days down, but believe you me… we are just starting to get warmed up.

Black & White, Christianity, Fisheye, Flowers, Naima, Nature, Railroad, Self-Portrait, Still Life, Street Photography, WPC - Alternate

But God, You Couldn’t Have Cared Less

September 26, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

I told you that BLACK & WHITE was my favorite theme and I wasn’t joking. I took a ton of BLACK & WHITE pictures for last week’s theme and every day (well almost every day) this week I’m going to share another collection of alternates. This first collection consists of the pictures that I took on Monday and Tuesday.

There is a rule in digital photography that you should never take pictures in black & white. You should take them in color and convert the images to black & white with editing software. The reason for this is because you can always take color away from a digital image, but you can’t add color back to it, if it was never there. (I mean, that is close enough to the truth. If you really wanted to you could make an attempt to add color to a black & white image, but it would probably come out looking like an outtake from THE INFENRAL CAULDRON.

Any Georges Méliès fans in the house? No? I’ll move on.

But I decided to ignore the rules and took all my pictures in “High Contrast Monochrome”. Cause you know how I feel about rules.

Rules are for fools.
Rules are for tools.
Rules are for ghouls.
Rules are for pools.

But rules for photography? Well, mostly they are guidelines that can and should be broken. From time to time.

I had big plans to get out there everyday and take plenty of beautiful, dare I say, tasty High Contrast Monochrome images. But right out of the bat, my Monday went south on me. There was a virtual mine collapse at the Computer Mine and I ended up working from 7 AM to nearly 11 PM. I only got a few pictures taken here and there while I was able to take a few breaks.

So most of the Monday images are just testing camera settings, playing with my old friend the fisheye and testing a point and shoot that I would need to use later in the week.

Here are the Monday images:

I swear that when I saw this image on the small screen I thought there was a reflection of Naima staring back at me from the lid of my grill. I mean it is an uncanny likeness.

This is actually “Rich Monochrome”. Basically a HDR black & white image. A setting, that has its uses, but I don’t love it.

My desk. Been thinking about building my own desk lately.

Test shot with the point & shoot

Tuesday I also wasn’t as active as I originally thought I might be. I actually got out of work on time, but I think Monday sucked my will to live out of me. I had a pretty lazy Tuesday. But I did get out of the house for a little bit to take Naima on a car ride and to take my neighbor’s cans to the can redemption center. I took a bit of street photography while I was out and about.

Here are Tuesday’s images:

Still so very, very, very, many black & white pictures to share with you guys!

Elizabeth, Self-Portrait, Still Life, Tenderloining

Food Truckin’: Lincoln Way and Duff Field Work

September 24, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

I have to give credit to Elizabeth. She would get the finder’s fee for this place if I gave people finder’s fee. Which isn’t to say that she has eaten there, but she recommended that I try it. She’s pretty good at making recommendations for restaurants she hasn’t tried. Curious.

Based on this “recommendation”, I made my way down to the corner of Lincoln Way and Duff to give a food truck by the name of The Sandwich Stop a try.

Here are some pictures:

I went with the Turkey Melt. Their menu describes it like this:

“Our turkey melt sandwich is piled on our house bread with tender turkey slices, tomatoes, mayo and crispy bacon between two pieces of gooey melted swiss cheese.”

It was 12 bucks and came with chips and a free drink. I’m not sure the drink was normally free or if they just threw me a free drink cause they like the cut of my jib.

The turkey melt was fantastic. Not a giant sandwich for somebody of my known appetites, but definitely delicious. I would get it again in a second.

However, this trip isn’t without its cautionary tale. Because the drink was unexpectedly free and I am mostly off the high fructose corn syrup sauce these days, I decided to go with the True North Black Cherry Pure Energy Seltzer. This was a huge mistake and I should have known it was going to be a huge mistake. I don’t like energy drinks and I don’t like seltzer. This drink was the worst of both worlds. I had maybe 2 swigs of it and then threw the demon spawn juice into the woods behind the Computer Mine.

I quickly took another bite of the delectable turkey melt and tried to forget about what had just transpired.

Here is a little bit about the Sandwich Stop from their website:

What can we say? We’re obsessed with sandwiches.

We are three brothers, Niko, Lukas & NJ Savage, with a special love for food and cooking. After we graduated from Iowa State we decided to get together and open our own Sandwich Stop Food Truck. The truck will specialize in rich, juicy, hot grilled sandwiches. We will also feature our very unique Brazilian sweet sandwiches. Come check us out and experience eating your sandwich with our own dipping sauce.

They are based out of The Quarters Apartments in Ames based on their website (sandwichstoptruck.com). But I have seen them out and about at other festivals. Including Jefferson, just 8 day ago. I’m not sure if they have a Facebook or an Instagram because there are links built into the website, but it doesn’t seem like the website has been fully programmed.

So to cut to the chase. Would I eat their again? I definitely would. Someday I want to try their Nutella Banana Grilled Cheese or their Touchdown Melt.

Next Sunday’s food adventure will involve another stop on the Tenderloin Trail 2.0.

Animals, Art, Logan, Macro, Naima, Railroad, Self-Portrait

As the Girls You Had Before

September 23, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

Time to start firing away on the 2023 backlog. This is a collection of pictures I took in January that really didn’t fit into any other posts. Some were pictures of my beard before I shaved. Some are from Madrid. Some are of elk in Jester Park. Some might be disturbing. Some might not be disturbing enough.

I hope you enjoy this collection:

Logan took these first 2 pictures.

It always feels good to clear up some of the backlog. There is still more backlog from January left to share.

Art, Jesse, Self-Portrait, Still Life, Street Photography, Tenderloining

Food Truckin’: Des Moines Art Festival Field Work

September 3, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

A couple of months back Jesse and I went to the Des Moines Arts Festival. We consumed art, drink, food, and ice cream. If you’ve never been to the Des Moines Art Festival is is a hard recommend for me. UNLESS… you don’t like art or music or food. And if you don’t like art or food or music… what is WRONG with you! Seriously. Get help. Lots of help.

We made a lap around all the food trucks before ultimately deciding on Nina’s Tacos. I got the nachos. It was one of the best decisions I’ve made in recent history.

A decent line for Nina’s tacos.

But it moved quickly. The drink lines didn’t move so quickly.

I got the Nachos Birria.

So many layers of delicious.

A closer look at delicious.

1st bite.

Cheese in my beard, not even mad.

No regrets.

We went to Over the Top for a little dessert action.

I went with Black Raspberry. No surprise.

A lot of sexy for one picture. I’m talking about the ice cream.

Sometimes I lay awake at night. I think about all the dead ends I’ve tried to go down. All the broken roads I’ve travelled. All the mistakes that I have made. All the regrets that burden me. Then I think about those nachos and realize that the road I’m on must be alright. Then I fall asleep and dream of birria.

As for the ice cream? You know I have the Ted Lasso policy on ice cream:

Ice cream is the best. It’s kinda like seeing Billy Joel perform live. Never disappoints.

But I should share some pictures of some of the art that I liked at the art festival.

Here are some cruddy cell phone pictures of some amazing art:

If you don’t appreciate the possum sculpture, know that you are Cal from TITANIC. I am Rose from TITANIC in this situation.

The difference between Cal’s taste in art and mine is that I have some.

The possum is amazing and anybody that thinks differently is a fool!

I will have pictures with the real camera to share at some point in the future.

Next Sunday’s food adventure will be a bit different. I will share photos from Scott’s progeny competing in the Iowa State Fair barbecue contest.

Art, Self-Portrait, Still Life, Tenderloining

Donut O’Clock – Jefferson Field Work

August 27, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

Back in June I got a surprise day off from work. They had re-shuffled PTO and suddenly I either had to take a day off or I was going to max out on PTO and therefore lose PTO. Yeah, I don’t play that game. On my surprise day off I went to the High Trestle Trail. Then I went to Jefferson to try a donut place I had recently heard about. Dunkers by Matt.

I’m not a fancy donut guy. I like your basic cake donut with frosting and sprinkles. But Dunkers By Matt definitely intrigued me. One of the things that most intrigued me is the fact that you can get a 7 inch or 12 in donut. I wasn’t able to get this massive donut because you have to pre-order them, but I hope to get one some day.

Here are some pictures from the trip:

I got to the bakery late, which is the cardinal sin of bakery eating. They donuts were pretty much picked over and there weren’t a ton of donut holes left, but I still had an amazing experience!

The woman was working gave me extra donut holes for free, noting that she can’t count very well when she is upside down. Then she made the blank long johns that were left and then finally threw in a maple bacon long john for free since the person that had ordered it never came in and picked it up.

The donut holes were fantastic! And they seem to frequently have special donut holes on Wednesday and Saturdays. On their Facebook page they have posted Red Velvet Donut Holes, Cherry, Birthday Cake, Strawberry & Cream, Salted Caramel and Apple Crisp!

I don’t really have a way of rating donuts. They are donuts! They are fantastic! I’m going to keep my eye on their Facebook page and have to make a trip the next time they make those Apple Crisp or Salted Caramel and Red Velvet donut holes. I believe my birthday in 2024 is on a Saturday. My birthday present to myself might just be that 12 inch donut! Play your cards right and you might just get an invite to help me eat that 12 inch donut.

Dunkers by Matt can be found at:
119 North Chestnut Street
Jefferson, Iowa

Next Sunday’s food adventure will involve the Des Moines Art Festival.

Flowers, Lensbaby, Macro, Music, Sara, Self-Portrait, Shawn Lockner

Whatever You Do

August 24, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett 4 Comments

If I don’t owe you a favor, you don’t know me
I don’t believe we’ve ever even met
If there’s a God in heaven you can show me
Then I guess I should admit I lost the bet
There are moments I could hold you forever
There are moments that lasted way too long
There are days when I change with the weather
To hold you in place would be wrong

I never met a morning I could get through
With nothing on my breath to hold the night
And I never said I’m sorry but I meant to
I never met a coward I don’t like
There are reasons why the body stays in motion
But at the moment only demons come to mine
There are days when I could walk into the ocean
With no one else but you to leave behind

There’s a road left behind me that I would rather not speak of
And a hard one ahead of me too
I love you, whatever you do
But I got a life to live too
-Brandi Carlile

As you all should know, on Monday I got a chance to see Brandi Carlile in concert for the first time in several years. It was an amazing concert! I had almost forgot how amazing of a live performer she is. Almost! I definitely can’t let it be so long before I see her live again!

I might be a little out of practice with taking selfies since I’m not doing THE SELFIE PROJECT this year so apparently the selfie I took with Sara and Shawn caused quite the stir…

I took this selfie and sent it to a few people:

One of the responses I got back was:

The girl behind you is practically showing her boob. She must know the kind of pictures you like.

I guess I walked into that one.

I guess we got Photo-boobed. I mean Boob-bombed. I mean boobs!

Anyways, I will still treasure this picture and this moment in time.

But Thursday is for flowers! Here is some flowers from my yard:

There is one last collection of images of flowers taken from my yard on this day left to share.

Nader, Road Trip, Self-Portrait, Still Life, Tenderloining

I Scream: Glidden Field Work

August 13, 2023 Christopher D. Bennett

After I knocked down the mind-blowing tenderloin from Darrell’s Place, we started to head back to Boone. However, we needed to get some ice cream! We stopped at The Dairy Mart in Glidden.

Here are some pictures: