Day 55/365 - Arrrhh!

This skull-and-crossbones is tattooed on my upper left arm. I got it done when I was in the Navy. I thought about getting a second tattoo on my right arm to balance things out, but I never got around to it. So now I'm lopsided.

I've wanted to be a pirate ever since I was small (although there was a period around the time that 'Star Wars' came out that I modified that slightly and wished I were a Corellian Space Pirate). My friends and I would play pirate all the time. I always got to be the captain, of course.

We used the jungle gym in their backyard as our pirate ship and got some old costume jewelry from my mom to serve as our loot, which we kept in a cardboard box we painted to resemble a treasure chest. We sailed that jungle gym all over the Caribbean, raided a thousand ships, and pillaged a hundred ports without ever leaving our neighborhood.

Years later when my youngest niece came along I got her into playing pirates (it beat the hell outta playing with Barbies) and she and I made treasure maps out of old paper sacks, spyglasses out of empty paper towel rolls, and a pirate ship out of my sister's couch and I resumed my career as the Scourge of the Seven Seas.

Now I need someone else to hurry up and have kids so I can go back to playing pirate. It's much preferable to playing lawyer. There are rich merchant ships prime for the plucking and wealthy port towns brimming with gold. Time to teach those scurvy dogs to once again fear the name of Captain Kevin.

Arrrhh!

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 54/365 - It's Christmas Time, There's No Need to Be Afraid

These are the little Christmas trees in front of the U.S. Botanic Garden Conservatory at the base of Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. I spun my camera around on my finger while the shot was exposing just to see how it would turn out. I think it came out pretty cool.

Now that Thanksgiving has passed and December is here, it's no longer too early to start thinking about Christmas. Tonight 'How The Grinch Stole Christmas' (the excellent cartoon version, not the crappy movie version) is on tv and Wednesday they're going to be showing 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer' and for the first time ever it will be in HD. I'm pretty stoked about that.

While we're on the subject of Christmas, I'm prepared to argue ad infinitum that there are only three acceptable Rock & Roll Christmas carols -- "Do They Know It's Christmas" by Band Aid, "Rocking Around the Christmas Tree" by Brenda Lee, and "All I Want for Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey (which is still one of the only songs that will get me to dancing in the shower whenever it comes on the radio).

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Peek-a-Boo

This week's bonus photo from my archives is a shot I stumbled upon as I was leaving the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History one day. This little puppet on a popsicle stick thing was peeping out from the shadows in a groove on the base of one of the columns at the front of the building. I really liked the juxtaposition between the colorful, playful toy and the grave, grey formality of the column. It seemed to me like a good illustration of the double nature of DC -- the serious, workaholic, bureaucratic/wonky side and the fun, silly, arts-and-culture side.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 53/365 - Confessions of a Retro Boy

This is a replica of an old GE cathedral-style radio from the 1930s. My parents got this for me as a Christmas present years and years ago. I've loved big band jazz and old-time radio (or OTR as it's more familiarly known among we geeky collector types) programs ever since I was in high school. When everyone else at school was getting into Poison and Motley Crue I was discovering Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman -- music that was already old by the time my parents were my age. Even though I'm a self-confessed dance-phobe, I really wish I knew how to swing dance. That looks like fun.

It's a bit blasphemous to admit this, but I think I like OTR better than tv. Old radio programs are like tv shows without the pictures, kinda like the opposite of silent movies I guess. I think imagining the action going on in the program in your head even beats HD. There are many different genres of radio shows, but mostly I focus on collecting the adventure, spy, and detective programs (albeit with a few children's, western, science fiction, and horror programs thrown in as well). I have nearly 200 different programs comprising several thousand individual episodes in mp3 format in my collection. They're great to upload to my iPod and listen to at the pool or when I'm travelling. My favorite programs are probably Jungle Jim and Orson Welles' run on The Shadow.

This is probably my single-most nerdy area of activity. It doesn't get much geekier than collecting OTR. I don't just stop there, though. Noooooo. I also design album covers for each program I collect. I enjoy that almost as much I do listening to the programs themselves. Why settle for being simply nerdy when you can be absurdly nerdy?

BTW -- if your curiosity has been piqued, you can find a huge inventory of old radio programs available for free download from the Internet Archive.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 52/365 - At the Roller Derby

I went to my first ever roller derby tonight and had a great time. I had a suspicion I'd probably enjoy it; badass battlin' babes (on rollerskates yet) -- what's not to love? Plus the noms de guerre under which the women skate are awesome in their own right -- Skid Ho, Obitchuary, Condoleeza Slice, Camilla the Hun, and Crispi Ramahoochie to name but a few.

The amateur women's roller derby group in this area is called the DC Rollergirls and they put on about four matches a year. There are currently three teams that make up the DC Rollergirls -- the Cherry Blossom Bombshells, DC DemonCats, and Scare Force One. A former fourth team, the Secretaries of Hate, apparently folded earlier this year. This is the third season for the Rollergirls thus far and hopefully they'll stick around.

Tonight's match was held at the National Guard Armory and featured an exhibition between the Cherry Blossom Bombshells and a visiting side called the Northside Stranglers, who drew their members from various roller derby leagues in Pennsylvania and Maryland. Following that was the main event -- a matchup between Scare Force One and the DC DemonCats. Scare Force One came into the evening as champions of the past two seasons and holders of an undefeated record in league play. That all fell by the wayside tonight however as the DemonCats, cheered on by their mascot Beelzebubba, put a serious whuppin' on Scare Force One.

I unintentionally ended up wearing the DemonCats colors to the match tonight and once I noticed that fact I was pulling for them to win, so I was pretty pleased with the result. Plus the match gave me a great opportunity to work on my action and sports photography techniques. I used my flash for the exhibition bout and then when the batteries in it went kaput I switched to working on my panning technique with the second bout, so I got to polish up a couple different skillsets tonight.

There were loads of people there with cameras, including Erin from the DC Social group on Flickr. She and I both had a bit of lens envy over some of the set-ups people there had and we couldn't believe they would risk their uber-expensive lenses sitting right next to the track given the regularity with which the Rollergirls kept crashing and skidding into the first row of the crowd. I guess though that if you can afford camera equipment that pricey, then you can probably afford to replace it as well.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 51/365 - A Productive Day at the Office

If you have to be at work, the day after Thanksgiving is one of the most relaxing days of the year to be working -- hardly anyone is at the office and the few people who are generally don't feel like being bothered or bothersome. As a result, I spent today at work BS'ing with my friend and co-worker Chris (one of the two other people in my office who came to work today) and uploading, organizing, titling, describing, tagging, and geotagging the photos I took of the Thanksgiving Day parade and of New York City itself over the past two days.

The T1 connection we have at the office is much faster for uploading than the DSL connection I have at home, and that fact came in particularly handy given that I had just over 200 photos to upload. It took me most of the day to get my Flickr 'business' done, although I did have to waste thirty minutes at a meeting going over something I'd already explained. Seriously, who the hell schedules a meeting for the day after Thanksgiving? Communists.

It's silly for an office to even be open that day. It probably costs far more in utilities and security to keep buildings open on the Friday after Thanksgiving than any resulting productivity gain, especially given that most of the people who are at work aren't doing much that day. Or maybe that's just me.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 50/365 - I Love a Parade!

And what a parade this was! Today I saw the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade live and in-person in New York City. I've watched and loved this parade on tv ever since I was a little kid. Watching it on Thanksgiving morning has always been a part of my Thanksgiving routine. For about five years I've been toying with the idea of going up to NYC to see the parade in-person, and this year I finally did it!

It was awesome! My favorite part of the parade has always been the balloons and they're even cooler up close than they are on tv. The weather really cooperated, too. It was cold, but not freezing cold and the sun was out and it wasn't windy. It was pretty crowded along the parade route, but I found a good viewing spot on Central Park West near 67th Street. I got there about 7:45 and there were already 4-5 rows of people lined up in front of me. The parade started at 9:00 and lasted just under two hours.

After it ended, I walked through Central Park and meandered around town for a bit taking pictures before it was time to head over to Oscar's at the Waldorf-Astoria for Thanksgiving lunch. I had pumpkin bisque, soft breadsticks, artisanal cheeses, sauteed asparagus and carrots in a honey mustard glaze, dressing, candied yams, turkey, bread pudding, pecan pie, and chocolate mousse cake. It was delicious, but I don't think anything beats a home-cooked meal for Thanksgiving, no matter how fancy the restaurant.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 49/365 - On Broadway

Okay, so the picture is technically from 44th Street and not Broadway, you get the idea.

This afternoon I ditched work early and took the train up to New York. I decided to stay at the Best Western at the South Street Seaport. It's a pretty cool area. I'm going to have to come back another day when I've got more time and shoot loads of pictures. It's old and weathered looking and there are some great views of the Brooklyn Bridge.

I grabbed dinner just around the corner from my hotel, at the Bridge Cafe. It rocked. It's just a small, unpretentious, neighborhood restaurant with excellent food. In that regard, it reminded me a bit of my favorite eating place in the world -- the aptly named Le Restaurant in the Montmartre section of Paris. I started with the mixed green salad with pears, bleu cheese, candied walnuts, and citrus vinaigrette paired with the pumpkin beer they had on tap. Then it was on to the lobster pot pie with a side order of mac and cheese, washed down with another glass of pumpkin beer. I'd missed lunch, but this dinner more than made up for it.

After dinner I headed to the St. James Theatre to see the musical 'Gypsy' featuring Patti LuPone. I had never seen this show, but I knew it was supposed to be a classic with a plum role for a mature, belt-it-out style female singer. I hadn't realized how many great songs it had in it. There were about four songs that were instantly recognizable as well-known standards. Now I need to order the soundtrack off Amazon.

The story chronicles the life of the famous burlesque queen Gypsy Rose Lee and her loopy, controlling, over-the-top stage mother. As with most family dramas it was a bit dark, but it was also quite funny and moving. I liked this play a lot. In addition to lucking out with my choice of a play to see, I got lucky with my seat as well. Normally I spring for a pricier seat in the orchestra section, but I'd been to the St. James before to see 'The Producers' so I knew there were good views to be had from the balcony. Because the theatre was only about two-thirds full, they closed off the balcony and let us cheapskates sit down on the mezzanine level. Bonus!

I had been planning on grabbing some cheesecake and coffee after the show, but I was still so stuffed from dinner that I just headed back to the hotel to crash. Not exactly de rigeur for the city that never sleeps, but I knew I had to get up early Thursday if I wanted to get a good spot from which to watch the parade.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 48/365 - Checklist

Train tickets to/from NYC -- Check

Broadway show ticket -- Check

Hotel and restaurant reservations -- Check

Phone, iPod, and both cameras fully charged -- Check

Thermal underwear, sweater and rain poncho packed (just in case) -- Check

Weather forecast for Thursday -- 44 degrees and sunny, oh yeah!

Tomorrow afternoon I'm taking the train up to New York City so that on Thanksgiving day I can see the Macy's Parade live and in-person. I'm so excited I'm about to spontaneously combust!

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 47/365 - Dead Tree Graveyard

This stack of files and papers is my current workload, a sizeable chunk of which has to be completed before COB on Wednesday -- and given that Wednesday will likely only be a half-day that means I have to have it done by the time I leave the office tomorrow. Yay, fun.

Included in this mound of woe are an appeal of a protest determination, two appeals of agency decisions to terminate grants, a new grant program announcement, a demand letter to a grant recipient that owes us some money back, three grant modifications, and the notice of award boilerplate for a new grant program. It's enough to make you wish there were marauding packs of wild paper shredders or woodchippers wandering the halls of my office building looking for files to devour. These people are seriously infringing upon my goofing off time. I demand my inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness, dammit!

Today I was able to get the agency response to the appeal of the protest determination filed and got the program announcement reviewed and kicked it back with comments. So that means tomorrow I have to draft and file a brief addressing three legal issues underlying one of the grant termination appeals, review the demand letter (through rain, sleet and snow -- b*tches better have our money), and finalize the settlement status reports for the two grant appeals.

We have no interest in settling either of these appeals, but the judge ordered us to conduct settlement negotiations so I'll listen to what the other side has to say and then file reports saying the negotiations failed and the agency is not inclined to settlement at this juncture. It's largely a pointless exercise, but given that opposing counsel in one of the cases has yet to respond to my email or voicemail, I can report that fact and hopefully score some brownie points with the judge. Every little bit helps.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Pacific Sunset

Given that last week's bonus photo was of the sun rising over the Atlantic Ocean, in the interest of fairness I figured I'd use a shot of the sun setting over the Pacific Ocean for this week's picture from my archives. I took this photo at Mission Beach in San Diego, California when I went out there earlier this year to see the Nationals play the Padres (and lose).

Getting this shot was much easier than getting the sunrise shot in Florida. I didn't even have to get up early.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 46/365 - Lazy Sunday

This week's self-portrait is me being a lazy slug as I am most Sundays. I love lounging in this oversized armchair in my apartment and reading. Normally I sit completely sideways in it with my head on one armrest and my legs draped over the other, but I didn't figure that would photograph as well. In the winter I like to put my fireplace dvd in the player so then I can sit in this chair and read beside the fire blazing on my big screen.

I know -- I'm such a geek.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 45/365 - Pictures at an Exhibition

This afternoon I went over to Georgetown to check out the exhibits at the main FotoWeek DC gallery. There were some really amazing photos there. I saw some stuff that gave me some ideas I wanted to try. They had one cool exhibit that featured massive enlargements of photographer's contact sheets. That exhibit mentioned how, with the advent of digital photography, contact sheets are a bit of an endangered species. I still have some of my old contact sheets from my high school and college photography classes. I had been thinking about pitching them, but now I think maybe I'll hang onto them.

I was walking around the gallery today taking loads of photos of people looking at photos. At one point I think I got 'mistooken' for a working photographer. I was leaning over a railing taking shots of the lower gallery area and some girls that were coming up the stairs heard my camera going 'tchkuh, tchkuh, tchkuh' and got all excited because they thought they were going to end up in some artsy photographer's photo. One of them told the others to play it cool and just keep walking so it wouldn't mess up the picture.

Little did they know they were just going to wind up on my Flickr page rather than in a gallery. It's a sort of sad substitute for fame, but it beats nothing I suppose.

(With apologies to Mussorgsky's ghost for the theft of the title.)

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 44/365 - The Temple of Ra

I could list a dozen things that are wrong with this shot, but none of that seems to matter because I love it anyway. I guess that's the nature of love, though -- it's irrational, impractical, exasperating, irrepressible, intoxicating, exhilarating, and a thousand other adjectives both converse and complementary. It's destined to make you whole and destined to break you apart. It's everything we want and everything we dread and... and it's love. In the end I guess that describes it better than anything -- love is love.

Apologies for the somewhat morose note to today's entry. That's what a bottle of wine on a cold Friday night will do to you, and I don't even like wine. Champagne yes, wine no. I took this shot while riding the escalator up from the Metro station next to my office this morning. I love (there's that word again) coming up out of this station. You start out in the dark deep underground and then you see the broad beams of morning sunlight streaming through those square openings high on the wall and then they strike your face and you feel their warmth on your cheeks and it's like a baptism and a rebirth all in one. And it's even better when the guy with the saxophone is playing at the top of the escalator.

The way the morning light pierces the openings in the wall always makes me think of ancient Egyptian temples and the way many of them were designed so that they would be swathed in shadows until at a certain time of day the sun would be at the perfect angle to shoot a ray of light into their darkened hearts that would then strike the innermost shrine, the holy of holies, and bathe it in a golden glow.

That in turn makes me think of the ancient Egyptian solar myth, wherein the sun god Ra descends into the underworld each night to travel on his barge through the caverns of darkness where he wages his eternal war with the evil serpent Apep before re-emerging above ground at dawn, and that then makes me think of my daily commute on the subway train that resembles both a barge and a serpent and that carries me through darkened tunnels before the escalator brings me back up to the surface and the benediction that is the light of day.

It's cold here today. I need to go back to Egypt. It's 80 degrees and sunny there.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 43/365 - Big Coat Weather

I had to dig my overcoat out of the closet earlier this week and it doesn't look like I'll be putting it back any time soon. It hasn't been earmuff cold yet, but it's definitely been scarf and gloves cold in the mornings. Yesterday the temperature didn't poke its nose north of 40 degrees the whole day and tomorrow we're supposed to have flurries. Hopefully they'll last longer than the five minutes of flurries we had earlier in the week. If it's going to be cold, it might as well snow and be pretty as well.

It never actually gets that cold in this area. In the ten years I've been living here I think the temperature might have dropped into the single digits maybe 3 times and I don't think it has fallen below zero once. Usually the 20s are about as low as it gets here in wintertime. It gets much colder in Missouri where I grew up. Negative temperatures are fairly common there. Not to be gross, but sometimes it would be so cold that when I was waiting outside at the bus stop in the morning the snot in my nose would freeze up. If you've lived somewhere that gets really cold in winter, you know what I'm talking about.

Missouri regularly gets fairly heavy snowfall as well, unlike DC/NoVA. Not Buffalo or Green Bay heavy where the snow is measured in yards rather than inches, but it wasn't uncommon for us to get 10-12 inches of snow in a day when I was a kid. If DC gets half that then it's treated like a natural catastrophe of biblical proportions. Not that I'm complaining, mind you, because it means the Federal government shuts down and I get a free day off. Hopefully having a Chicago guy in the White House won't make it harder for the government to get snow days.

I need my free days off in wintertime. There are books to be read, old movies to be watched, and grilled cheese sammiches and tomato soup to be eaten.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 42/365 - Yin & Yang

Took this shot today as I walked over to the 'pay by the pound' cafeteria in the NASA building to pick up some lunch. I've been too busy/lazy to go to the store and get fixin's for lunch this week, so I've been buying my lunch -- which means I'm spending too much money and eating random combinations of stuff that's not particularly good for me. Today it was greasy fried fish (okay), half a turkey chimichanga (really good), wild rice with peas and some dark sort of sauce/seasoning (bleccchh), and bananas foster (delish). Grand total -- ten bones. 'Pay by the pound' tends to be a rip-off. And I didn't get around to going to the store tonight either, so I'm stuck buying lunch again tomorrow.

I like the light and shadow in this shot and the way they diagonally bisect the frame. It reminds me of the Yin and Yang symbol. Plus it's a train trestle and I love pretty much anything having to do with trains. That and 'trestle' is just a fun word to say: T R E S T L E... Not quite as cool as 'susurration' or 'frappé', but still pretty cool.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 41/365 - Pub Crawl

Tonight I went on a pub crawl to some bars and restaurants in the Columbia Heights and U Street areas of DC that are hosting the Pix Tour showcasing the work of local photographers as part of a big photography expo known as Foto Week. Some of the Pix Tour featured artists, like Angela and Marie, came along on the pub crawl.

We started out at RedRocks Pizzeria, site of Marie's show, to see her photos and load up on pizza to absorb the alcohol we were preparing to consume in the name of art. This shot is of the backbar at the second stop of the evening, the Wonderland Ballroom. From there, we wandered on to the Velvet Lounge (scene of Angela's show), Nellie's Sports Bar, and DC9.

The only one of these venues I'd been to previously was DC9, so this was a good chance for me to check out some new watering holes -- not to mention getting to see some really good photos and hang out with some cool fellow camera dorks. The photo exhibits on the Pix Tour are definitely worth seeing, so brace up your liver and go make your own pub crawl to check them out.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 40/365 - Word Games

Just got finished laying the Scrabble smackdown on my computer yet again. Okay, so I only beat the machine by 55 points this time. I've still beaten it nearly twice as many times as its beaten me (274 to 138, with one tie). And then there's the version of Scrabble I've got on my iPod. The computer still hasn't beaten me on that one. I could kick the difficulty level up a notch, but then the computer starts playing utterly ridiculous words no one but lexicographers have ever heard of before, and that takes the fun out of it.

My best score to date is 591 points. I managed to lay down three different seven-letter words in that game, two of them on back-to-back turns. I've never even come close to playing that well against another person, though. I think I've pretty much always loved playing word games. When I was in second grade and the weather was too crappy to go out for recess, we'd play Boggle for money (penny a point). I usually won. Good thing the teacher never realized what we were up to. Having to explain to the principal why I was Boggle-sharking my classmates wouldn't have been much fun.

My brother and sister-in-law got me into playing Scrabble. Whenever I go to visit them we always play. I even bought a travel Scrabble set to take with me when I went on a cruise with them a few years ago. I took it along when we went to Vegas earlier this year, too. I can usually wallop my brother, but sister-in-law clobbers me more often than not. She may have had to drop of high school to get a job, but her lack of a diploma doesn't stop her from cleaning my clock on a regular basis.

There's another game I like to play with words when I'm on the subway. I pick a word off one of the advertising posters or signs on the train and try to make as many new words out of its letters as I can. Helps to pass the time and keep my brain from gathering dust.

I also love doing the crossword puzzle in the newspaper and I can usually solve it, although once or twice a week there will be a square or two I can't get filled in. No sudoku for me, though. Numbers are something I don't enjoy, even when there's no actual math involved. I'll just stick to letters, thank you very much.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Twice on Sunday Bonus Photo - Atlantic Sunrise

This week's bonus photo from my archives is a shot I took of the sun rising over the Atlantic Ocean from the beach in Hollywood, Florida. I was down there for the wedding of my friends Chris and Desiree. It had been a while since I'd seen sunrise over the ocean, so I got up crazy early one morning and went down and sat on the beach while I listened to Bebel Gilberto's 'Tanto Tempo' cd on my iPod (it's the perfect soundtrack for sunrise on the beach, btw) and waited for the sun to come up.

It was gorgeous and well worth waking up early to see.

(Taken with my old Canon Powershot S400)

Day 39/365 - Phoebe

This is Phoebe, my pet philodendron. She's named after the character on 'Friends.' I have another one in my office that is named Daphne, after the character on 'Frasier." Philodendrons seem to be the only type of plant my brown thumb and I don't manage to kill off. I've tried my luck with a fern, cactus, bamboo plant, and ivy and none of them lasted very long in my less than stellar care. I even managed to murder my friend Desiree's plant that she had me look after while she was on vacation for a week.

I've had Phoebe for 14 years now. When I first got her she was just four little leaves in the middle of a big pot of dirt. And that's how she stayed for the first year. She didn't start growing until I hauled her off to law school with me and then she really took off. Now she has lots of leaves and long vines that are wrapped all around the legs of the barstool her pot sits on.

So unless you want your plant to die, or unless it's a philodendron, don't let me anywhere near it.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)