Hitting up the old 2019 backlog. The pictures I share today are from the graduation church service for our church’s seniors. The other pictures are pictures I took on the same day.
I have seen some of those kids, ahem, young adults since they moved on to their next adventures. I’ve seen Casey and Anna and Mackenzie and Megan and Halle. They are all doing great things!
Another big week for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. Double digits for the 17th week in a row. Double digits easy. Easier than walking a Thunderbird.
But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:
Elizabeth Nordeen
Andy Sharp
Carla Stensland
Carla Stensland
Carla Stensland
Kim Barker
Logan Kahler
Kim Barker
Sarah Karber
Shannon Bardole-Foley
Tamara Peterson
William McAlpine
Cathie Raley
Carla Stensland
Christopher D. Bennett
Mike Vest
But enough dwelling on the past. Time to look to the future. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future! This week’s theme:
WORK! What a great theme! But what is a WORK photo? It doesn’t just have to a picture from around your WORKplace, but that would certainly WORK. A WORK picture is a picture of anything that is used in WORK. Anybody that is engaged in WORK. Can be at their place of employment, but certainly doesn’t have to be. Remember the physics definition of WORK, the measure of engery transfer that occurs when an object is moved over a distance by an external force at least part of which is applied in the direction of the displacement.
I look forward to seeing your interpretations!
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A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION
The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week. I will point out that I have let that slide some in the past. I will not in the future. Since it is literally about the only rule.
Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.
OR
I now allow people to text me their submissions. In the past, I had made exceptions for a couple people that aren’t real computer savvy, even though it was an inconvenience for me and required at least 3 extra steps for me. I am now lifting that embargo because I have a streamline way of uploading photos. I’m not giving out my phone number, but if you have it, you can text me.
It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.
That is it, them’s the rules.
A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION
Congrats to Aaron Barnett. He is the latest person to show taste, class, and sophistication by signing up for an email subscription to Photography 139’s online journal “An Artist’s Notebook”. I worked with Aaron in another life at the Boone outpost of the Evil Clown Empire. So if you see Aaron out and about, give him a knowing glance and teach him the super secret Photography 139 handshake.
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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very worked Monday!
For starters, happy birthday Anders! We celebrated Anders’ birthday last night at January birthday night with yellow cake, a DOLEMITE double feature, and a root beer tasting.
After all, DOLEMITE is my name and (expletive deleted) up mother (expletive deleted) is my game!
Here are some pictures of a man I consider to be at least the equal of Dolemite!
One of my secret (I guess) goals of 2020 is to be more proactive about putting information for Movie Night up on the website. Because if you are reading these words, you are invited to Movie Night.
But be warned, you may never be the same after you attend Movie Night. Exposure to great art tends to change a person. In fact, I think Movie Night broke Willy.
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Enough about Anders’ birthday. Let’s talk about my birthday. Last year Jesse and I took a road trip around my birthday. One of the stops we made was at The Little Brown Church. There were a bunch of LARPers there. Maybe they were time travelers. Either way, they were dressed up like it was the Civil War.
Here are some pictures from that stop:
Jesse had never heard of The Little Brown Church, but it is the church from that song. You know the song. The song about the little brown church.
There’s a church in the valley by the wildwood
No lovelier spot in the dale
No place is so dear to my childhood
As the little brown church in the vale
Our church hosted a filmmaker who made a documentary about it once. It was interesting, but it didn’t feature one time traveler.
There are a ton of photos in the folder 2009-08-24. Most of them are from my trips to the Iowa State Fair in 2009. However, there is also a good chunk of them that are pictures of Teresa and Ernie.
This is already going to be a long post, so I don’t want to overwhelm you with a ton of words up front. I want to overwhelm you with pictures on the backside:
By adding these pictures to the Photography 139 Gallery, I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entry to its original glory:
Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve some Stephanie and some of my mad gardening skills.
Last year I failed to make it to Pella to photograph tulips. In fact, I think it has been a couple of years since I’ve been to Pella. Which is sad, because I really enjoy photographing tulips. Even though, there are those that hate my flower photography, I persist.
While I didn’t make it to Pella last year, I did photograph a lovely patch of tulips behind Curtiss Hall on Iowa State’s campus while I was waiting for a Bernie Sanders event to start.
In many ways, that is better than Pella since it is known that Iowa State is superior to Central. While Central is filled with a bunch of wooden-shoe-humpers, Iowa State is filled with some of the best people on earth.
Here are my tulip photos:
Truth is that I will probably effort to make it to Pella this tulip season. If for no reason that I need to visit their bakeries. While dutch letters are straight trash, bokkepootjes are a little slice of heaven.
That is right, Photography 139, come for the high quality flower photography and stay for the straight fire pastry takes.
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This is your reminder that this week’s WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is COUNTRY:
A COUNTRY photo is any photo that is taken outside of a city or town.
Happy photo harvesting!
I took a few pictures on Easter of last year that seems like a good time to share.
I think the pictures of the Easter Egg Hunt were taken by Jaxon. In fact I’m positive they were taken by Jaxon.
We are a little more than a month away from Lent now and I’ve been thinking on what I’m going to do for Lent. I would say that traditionally Methodists don’t really give up something for Lent. Instead they add something for Lent.
I’ve been playing with the idea of going pescatarian for Lent.
Why pescatarian?
#1. Eating less meat is the best thing you can do to help the planet:
Industrialized agriculture and the onset of the worst species extinction crisis since the demise of the dinosaurs means that livestock and humans now make up 96% of all mammals. But despite consuming the vast majority of farmland, meat and dairy accounts for just 18% of all food calories and around a third of protein.
The mighty hoofprint of farmed meat isn’t just inefficient. Deforestation to make way for livestock, along with methane emissions from cows and fertilizer use, creates as much greenhouse gas emissions as all the world’s cars, trucks and airplanes. Meat rearing practices risk mass extinctions of other animals, as well as spawn significant pollution of streams, rivers and, ultimately, the ocean.
#2. Goals should be realistic and attainable. While going pescatarian will vastly reduce the amount of meat I eat, it is a realistic goal, because I know there is no way I could pull off going full vegetarian and let’s not talk about going vegan.
#3. A pescatarian diet is healthier. It is healthy for the heart, reduces the risks of some cancer, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome.
#4. The prophet Kurt Cobain taught us that “it’s okay to eat fish, ’cause they don’t have any feelings.”
This means that I need to get that road trip to Corning with Shannon to tenderloin it up on the books before February 26.
Back in May I went to see Evie perform during her piano recital. The recital was in Chocolaterie Stam in downtown Ames. I arrived early, so I wandered around downtown Ames and took a few photos that I’d like to share now:
I still really haven’t set 2020 photography goals for myself, besides make the blog more current. But one of them might be to do more street photography.
I would be remiss if I didn’t open today without wishing everybody a Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Today, I want to share some of his words following the end of the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Often our movement has been referred to as a boycott movement. The word boycott, however, does not adequately describe the true spirit of our movement. The word boycott is suggestive of merely an economic squeeze devoid of any positive value. We have never allowed ourselves to get bogged in the negative; we have always sought to accentuate the positive. Our aim has never been to put the bus company out of business, but rather to put justice in business.
These twelve months have not at all been easy. Our feet have often been tired. We have struggle against tremendous odds to maintain alternative transportation. There have been moments when roaring waters of disappointment poured upon us in staggering torrents. We can remember days when unfavorable court decisions came upon us like tidal waves, leaving us treading in the deep and confused waters of despair. But amid all of this we have kept going with the faith that as we struggle, God struggles with us, and that the arc of the moral universe, although long, is bending toward justice.5 We have lived under the agony and darkness of Good Friday with the conviction that one day the heightening glow of Easter would emerge on the horizon. We have seen truth crucified and goodness buried, but we have kept going with the conviction that truth crushed to earth will rise again.6
(later)
This is the time that we must evince calm dignity and wise restraint. Emotions must not run wild. Violence must not come from any of us, for if we become victimized with violent intents, we will have walked in vain, and our twelve months of glorious dignity will be transformed into an eve of gloomy catastrophy. As we go back to the busses let us be loving enough to turn an enemy into a friend. We must now move from protest to reconciliation. It is my firm conviction that God is working in Montgomery. Let all men of goodwill, both Negro and white, continue to work with Him. With this dedication we will be able to emerge from the bleak and desolate midnight of man’s inhumanity to man to the bright and glittering daybreak of freedom and justice.
If you are ever in Memphis, I can’t urge you to visit the Civil Rights Museum strongly enough.
It is an extremely powerful and rage inducing experience.
As white supremacy continues to be emboldened in this country and has made an ugly resurgence in the last couple of years, I pray that after this current shameful chapter in American history closes, that there is some real healing in this country.
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WooHoo! TEXTURE makes is 17 straight weeks of double digit submissions! I was a little worried about this week because TEXTURE is one of the more abstract themes. Not technically difficult, but a little on the obtuse side. Plus, at least in central Iowa the temperature barely climbed into positive digits all weekend. But, we hit double digits and I barely had to twist any arms this morning!
But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates, you came to see the submissions:
Monica Henning
Elizabeth Nordeen
Carla Stensland
Michelle Haupt
Sarah Karber
Stephanie Kim
Shannon Bardole-Foley
Christopher D. Bennett
Dawn Krause
Becky Parmelee
Micky Augustin
Cathie Raley
Tamara Peterson
Tamara Peterson
Kim Barker
But enough dwelling on the past. Time to look to the future. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future! This week’s theme:
COUNTRY! What a great theme! But what is a COUNTRY photo? A COUNTRY photo is really just any photo that is taken outside of a town, city, village, or hamlet. This should be easy enough. I know plenty of you (like me) drive through the COUNTRY to get to work. Some of you live in the COUNTRY. But something doesn’t have to be in the COUNTRY to suggest the COUNTRY. Plus, remember that the word COUNTRY has more than one meaning. A quality tip for people who live in the middle of say Brooklyn or Minneapolis.
I look forward to seeing your interpretations!
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A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION
The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week. I will point out that I have let that slide some in the past. I will not in the future. Since it is literally about the only rule.
Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.
OR
I now allow people to text me their submissions. In the past, I had made exceptions for a couple people that aren’t real computer savvy, even though it was an inconvenience for me and required at least 3 extra steps for me. I am now lifting that embargo because I have a streamline way of uploading photos. I’m not giving out my phone number, but if you have it, you can text me.
It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.
That is it, them’s the rules.
A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION
Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.
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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very country Monday!
Back in November, the grocery store in Ogden burned down, making Ogden the latest small town to become a food desert.
What is a food desert?
As defined by the United States Department of Agriculture, a food desert is an area in which at least a third of the population lives more than mile from a supermarket or grocery store, or ten miles for rural communities. Now the closest grocery store to Ogden is Fareway in Boone. Hy-Vee is you take Old 30.
The closest Ogden has to a grocery store is a Dollar General. Which is unfortunate because dollar stores are increasingly becoming the only thing close to grocery stores that many rural and urban communities have. This is bad because while dollar stores sell food, they very rarely sell fresh food or even healthy food. Instead, they concentrate on selling unhealthy foods like candy, chips, and pop. Few than 3 percent of Dollar General stores offer any healthy options at all.
Unfortunately the recent dominance of dollar stores in urban and rural areas isn’t gong to be reversed because of the increased concentration of food distribution, it is more difficult for independent grocery stores to survive. It becomes a never ending cycle because having a dollar store in your town can actually make it poorer. The average rural grocery store supports 14 employees, while the dollar store has only 9 employees. Those 9 employees make 30% less in wages.
Essentially, dollar stores move to poor areas and then lock in the poverty in the area to keep their customer base. Lower wage employees force taxpayers to subsidize the health care of these employees.
For more information on what you can do to keep dollar stores out of your town, click on the link below:
Here are some pictures from the remains of the Ogden grocery store:
I wish I would have got some pictures of the grocery store burning down, but that night I was at a Boone High School production of “Into the Woods” where Autumn and Akela from the youth group gave amazing performances. As did Nick who hasn’t joined us for youth group this year. Hector and Leah did some solid work with the tech crew. As did Anders’ son.
It was a busy night in Boone County. A train derailment closed down the Hy-Vee and another garage in Boone caught fire. I didn’t get any pictures of those.
