Moving Update

Well, there I was saying nasty things about Time Warner and they go and turn all efficient and helpful on me. Originally, the website said I needed to go down to their office and yadda yadda, but I called them up and they scheduled an install the next day, so hey presto, I've got cable and the internet. Hooray!

Other developments. My old bike was in really bad shape, so it found a new home and I got a new one. Hooray again! I haven't been riding to school in about a year now - ever since I came back from Japan, I guess. Anywhoo, I rode around a bit yesterday and today, and it feels so good to be riding again. I live a ways away from school, but one of my friends bikes in every day from about the same area, so I might give it a shot, too.

That's because I'm teaching summer school, starting tomorrow. I'm always a bit nervous before a new class, but I've already taught this particular class two times here, so hopefully it'll go well.

Oh, I promised photos of the new pad, so here we go with a couple pre-move in shots:

Living room:


















Kitchen:

More Moving

Woot! The moving begins! I should be in the new apartment by the end of the week.

I'm looking forward to new and exotic cable channels.

That's sad, right?

Yeah, that's sad.

Moving, ya know, it's a funny thing. One of the boxes that I always moved without opening for the past 3 or 4 moves fell apart when I was organizing things, so I had to rebox it. It was full of old pre-digital photos from about 2000 when I was teaching abroad and right when I met the woman I would date for the next 5 years. There were so many other people in those photos too. I'm not in contact with any of them anymore. I guess I'm just kind of like that. That's a part of me that I'm not particularly happy about.

Need Strange Videos? Of Course You Do.

You remember these guys? They would make the perfect librarians.


Beware of flume rides.


If you survive the flume ride, maybe you could go on this game show. Japan makes me laugh.


Funky music video with old revival video


And a link to a table I want. You know, eventually, when I actually have a place to put it.


Added bonus:
Ah, for days gone by in the Oklahoman schoolhouse: fingernail inspection. Optional caption: "You're soaking in it."

I wish this map of all humanity were bigger so I could try to find out where I live.

And finally, the true argument against Star Wars and for Star Trek: despots vs. populists.

Ok, my tabs are clear.

Lessons Learning

Wisdom from the land of the online dating sites:

• Photos:
• Ok, I'm superficial. Fine, I can handle that. I need pictures, plural. (and eHarmony, I really don't want to pay you for the pleasure. grrr...)
  
• I know, I'm a camera geek, but surely you can see that the quality of the picture you uploaded is bad, right?
  
• Half face covered in shadow
• 16 pixels total
• blurry because the camera didn't focus or blurry because you blurred it?
• Red eyes? ix-nay on the demonic irlfriend-gay
• Dark hair? Dark clothes? Dark background? bad photo? Ah! Floating HEAD!
  
• Where are you? Disneyword? Cute. Paris? Cool. The bathroom? Awkward. Also, is that a rifle in the background?
• Why are you clutching lovingly at the guy there? If that's a brother or friend or something, a note would be nice.
  
• related - Disturbing crops. Who or what did you crop out of that photo. Are you leaning on a photogenically ugly wall or Bin Laden?
  
• I know that you are trying to show that you are active and all, but if you are in mortal danger in each of your photos, perhaps you ain't for me.
• Cute picture of you at the bar with friends? cool, shows you are sociable and what you do for fun.
• Several photos of you completely sloshed and slightly drooling? Not so cool. Shows you are sociable and what you do for fun.
• Glamor shots. Ok, this may be just me, but a woman who can dress up or down for anything is very attractive. A woman who wears an inch and a half of pancake, chisel-proof hair, tilts her head at a 45 degree angle and looks back over her head with a runaway bride look in her eyes - not so much.
• Cleavage. Now don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of cleavage, and there's nothing wrong with showing it in your pictures, but c'mon cameraman, the eyes are up here. If the photo is focused on your boobs, and I can see more than your plastic surgeon could, I'm going to assume that's all you have to offer.
• Animals. Again, I get it. You love animals. I do too. But if there are significantly more pictures of your beloved Bingo then of you, I'm curious if there's room in your world for anyone else.

I'm learning more and more every day :)

Tilt You Head 3 Dergrees To The Left And Cough

Ok, after updating the 365 page, I can say that it is killing me to not even be able to rotate photos. Cropping is even beyond me! Grrr...

Also, I am fairly certain, that I have become very fast and loose on the whole concept of what a day is. I think I lost at least one in there somewhere. My cameras still think they are living on US time, and frankly I dont have the heart to correct them.

I Can Post A Title Today!

More photos up at Flickr. Please be aware that I have no image editing software here (I thought Photoshop made the migration to the laptop, but alas, I guess it did not). And darned if Japan isnt a first world nation that generally refuses to flaunt international copyright and intellectual property rights openly in stores, unlike sooome nearby countries.

Aaaaand We're Back

We being myself and the frog in my pocket.

So I took a bit of a summer vacation on really short notice - That's why I didn't give notice here. After my google-enforced disappearance earlier, I should have been more kind and let you all know. Sorry about that.

Anyway, I flew way over to visit my family up in the incredible bay cities. There was a mom, a sister-blogger (arguably - she doesn't update much :) ), a brother-blogger, a couple of nieces a brother-in-law and even a Zero-blogger. Add in a couple of cats and several days of wandering all over the area, and much fun was had by all.

Naturally, there were billions and billions of photos taken. I'm editing and uploading as we speak. Of course, you won't get to see the people pictures. There are several painfully cute pictures of the nieces. You'll just have to imagine those.

I'll post a bit more about the trip later

Lightboxen

Scrivener asked about the homemade lightbox I made for the smoke pictures. I got the ideas here (lightbox) and here (smoke). So here's what I've got:



It's basically just a cardboard box with windows cut out on the sides and top. I draped paper towel over the windows to act as a diffuser until I can get something a little better (tracing paper? sheet?). Inside on the back and bottom are chucks of black foamboard. Then there's a lamp on the left and an old slave flash on the right in addition to the diffused hotshoe flash on the camera itself.

The setup didn't work that well actually though. I think with a little tweaking it'll get better. The main problem was that there still wasn't as much light as I would have liked for the smoke. The on-camera flash was also too direct, even with my bounce diffuser. I think the answer is to get a shop lamp, or something like that - something with a little more umph than my little desk lamp.

As for the smoke itself, I used incense sticks poked into the cardboard. Camera settings were ISO100, 1/250 and my best ones came out at about f11 or f14, but I'm sure that could be changed a lot.

Finally I popped it into Photoshop and fiddled with the colors. Fair warning - clean your glass. every tiny little dust speck will show up :)

Anyway, if you aren't checking out my photo365 or flickr pages, here's some incense smoke!

January in Photos

From my Photo365 blog:



Billie did this over at the Parts-n-Pieces' Project 365 blog and I really liked the idea, so I stole it.

I'm afraid my analysis will be less clear and insightful though. I have found it difficult to keep shooting, even when, or especially when, I'm not feeling inspired. I think it has helped me though. I am looking with photographer's eyes more often during the day and I like that a lot (and I promise I'll give them back eventually).

The thing is, I was never sure if this was going to be a photo journal of my daily meanderings, or a photo project to push myself to look for new pictures in familiar places. I think it's becoming both, even though I think it might be more rewarding if I focused on one or the other.

As for the photos themselves, it seems clear that I like patterns and graffiti. I'm trying to find new angles and perspectives, but many fall short. In particular, I'm disappointed in the candle shot. I really thought it would me more interesting. I'm a sucker for a cheap laugh and use food as comfort.

hmm... Maybe that should be my personal ad.