Tag: Photo Posts

Posted on

Rainbows, flames, and giant ducks

Last week I picked my mother up at the airport, and it was right after a rain storm had passed through. We don’t get many rainbows in this area, so it’s always exciting when we do!

A rare rainbow (rare in our neck o'the woods). #rainbow

(I remember when we lived in the Portland, OR area, we’d see rainbows almost daily. Because it rained, well, almost daily.)

This weekend the World’s Biggest Rubber Duck was in Buffalo. Yes, we went down there to see it.

GIANT DUCK IN THE WATER! FLY YOU FOOLS!! #canalside #buffalo #bigassduck

Ayup. That’s a big duck, all right.

And yesterday the dee-oh-gee and I hiked through Chestnut Ridge to the Eternal Flame waterfall. I’d long wanted to see this, and now I have! It’s quite a hike to get there, but very much worth it when you arrive.

At last! The Eternal Flame! #ChestnutRidge #wny #OrchardPark #summer #eternalflame

The flame, up close #ChestnutRidge #wny #OrchardPark #summer #eternalflame

By the Flame #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound #ChestnutRidge #wny #OrchardPark #summer #eternalflame


At the Flame, people generally take their turns stepping up and shooting photos and whatnot before departing so the next folks can do likewise. The group two “turns” ahead of me took extra time, though, so we had to wait about ten minutes. Their reason for taking extra time was justifiable, though: it was two couples, and the man in one couple had chosen this place to ask his girlfriend to marry him. Just as Cane and I arrived, he was dropping to one knee and she was doing the “OMG!” thing. Much smiling and laughing and crying and whatnot. Their other friends, who were in on it, broke out a bottle of champagne they’d toted in their backpack. It was all very nice, and we got to see the Eternal Flame.

Oh, and I’ve been writing, too. More on that another time!

Share This Post

Posted on

It’s Prismatic!

So there’s this new photo app called Prisma that’s all the rage. It’s kind of cool, really — it’s similar to Instagram in that it takes photos (new or existing) and applies filters to them to make them look nifty. The difference is that Prisma’s filters don’t just tweak certain aspects of the photo, like contrast or color balance or such things; Prisma uses your photo as the basis for a new image, called an “artwork”, in a certain artistic style, specified by use of the filter. It takes a little getting used to (and I’m not quite there yet), and initially I found it hard to see the appeal, but as I played with it more (mostly using existing photos), I found myself also liking it more.

Here’s a selection of photos that I filtered through Prisma. Some of these look really nifty, if I do say so myself!

I may be biased, but I think that these are all pretty cool!

Share This Post

Posted on

The Fair 2016

Photos from the Erie County Fair, 2016

Ribbon fries #eriecountyfair

Wow. Stroh's. Blast from the past! #eriecountyfair #strohs

Quilt detail #eriecountyfair #quilt

Detail from vintage jewelry box. AM&A's was the department store chain in Buffalo and WNY back when every region had its own department store brand. #buffalo #eriecountyfair

Llama #eriecountyfair #llama

Bunny #eriecountyfair #rabbit

Wife and another horse #eriecountyfair #horse

Woodcarving guitar. #woodcarving #eriecountyfair


And in new acquisitions, among a few other things (including a new coffee mug which I haven’t photographed yet), a new scarf and a new keychain!

New scarf I bought at the County Fair! #scarf #overalls #vintage #Lee #HickoryStripe #tiedye

I got a new keychain! Huzzah!!! #eriecountyfair #millenniumfalcon #starwars


There was actually some new stuff to see at the Fair this year that felt fresh and nifty, which was nice; sometimes the Fair can seem a little “Same old, same old”. We do miss certain things about the Fair — particularly the daily parade, which was always fun to watch — but we did have a great time.

Now, of course, with the Fair being over (for us, anyway), I am mentally shifting gears already into Fall Mode. This is usually helped along by August in Buffalo generally being cooler and less humid than July, but that certainly hasn’t turned out to be the case this year; instead it’s been just as hot and humid in August as in July, and our region is actually in the midst of a pretty severe drought. We’ve actually had measurable rainfall over the last few days, but earlier we went something like 80 days without a drop, so things are pretty parched ’round here. Hopefully it’ll rebound.

Anyway, that’s the Fair for this year. The next big things? Buffalo Comic-con, then our annual trek to Ithaca for the Apple Harvest Festival, and then…who knows! The sky’s the limit, folks!

Share This Post

Posted on

Animal Adventures

Here’s what happens when one cat gets to go outside on a supervised jaunt, leaving his brother and the dog behind:

Cane and Julio are unhappy that Lester is outside. #Julio #catsofinstagram #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound

Here’s what happens when the dog is waiting for me to finish my morning writing and take him out:

He'd say Good Morning, but he isn't up yet. #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound

Here’s what happens when I wake up the other cat from his nap:

Huh.... #Lester #catsofinstagram

Here’s what it looks like when the dog is not cooperative for his photo-op:

Uncooperative dee-oh-gee is uncooperative. #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound #overalls #vintage #Key #bluedenim

Here’s what happens on a lazy weekend morning:

Saturday morning: coffee, overalls, and a sleeping dee-oh-gee. #Ahhhh #overalls #pointerbrand

Here’s what happens when we’re at the park and the dog get hot and finds some water:

Cane loves water. #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound #ChestnutRidge #wny #OrchardPark

And here’s what happens when the dog actually cooperates for his photo-op.

Good LORD, that is one good-looking dee-oh-gee! Seriously, he is a FANTASTIC fashion accessory. #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound #overalls #Dickies #bleacheddenim

Share This Post

Posted on

Does whatever a spider can!

One of my important weekly tasks at The Store is running our generator load test. This is when I activate our store’s generator and let it run the store’s emergency systems for a half hour or so, just to make sure it’s doing its thing correctly. The generator is located in one of the two power houses, which is an enclosed machine room actually on the roof. The power houses are not sealed against the outside, and therefore during the summer months, the power houses can — and usually do — become home to a lot of spiders.

Now, I like spiders a lot. I think they’re nifty and they do important work by eating flies and whatnot. (My admiration and respect for spiders vanishes utterly if one actually manages to get on me, though. If that happens, it’s Squishing Time.) There was a particularly big spider in there this morning, and while sometimes when there get to be too many of them I’ll knock down their webs, this one I decided to let go for a while as he/she was spinning a web.

But of course I documented the activity photographically. Here is Phil*, in action!

I name all spiders "Phil". #spiders

Phil (or Philippa) hard at work. #spiders

Phil ignored me. Thanks, Phil! #spiders


*I always dub specific spiders “Phil”, in honor of this clip from Friends.


And yes, I’m aware that this might have actually been a Philippa. I have no idea how to tell, though.

Share This Post