Flower Power

Last time I was in California, I took many, many pictures of flowers. And I'm sure I'll do the same thing again this time. Wait and see...

One Week To Go

This time next week, I'll be in Berkeley, California, seeing the sights and enjoying the week off of work. I've been reviewing the pictures I took out there four years ago, just to help me remember what I want to see again this time, and that's where these pictures come from. I hope to take much better shots this time around, because I think I've learned a lot in the past four years. We'll have to wait and see, now waon't we? The pictures I'm posting today all came from a single afternoon in Golden Gate Park. It's a huge man-made park, similar to Central Park in NYC, but that doesn't make it any less beautiful. It stretches from nearly downtown all the way to the Pacific Ocean, but oddly enough doesn't abut the Golden Gate itself. The shot above is one of two windmills in the park. I seem to remember that the other was in pieces when I was there, soon to be reconstructed. Hopefully it's done by now. Below is a small pagoda in the Japanese Tea Garden. I was there late last time, and it was closed, so I had to take this shot from outside the actual garden. I'm not going to make that mistake this trip.


Above is just a snail in some yellow leaves. I don't know the type of snail or the plant, but I thought it was a great contrast, with the spiral shell and the oddly colored leaves. Sometimes you get lucky and find something appealing to the eye. Below is one of the stone bridges that dot the park. I seem to remember all of the water in the park was green, and I'm pretty sure it's dyed that way for whatever reason. But it makes for a nice contrast.

This Week In June

Yep, it's time for another calendar page. This week is a shot of the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland where it meets Lake Erie. The area is known as The Flats, and it used to be the hip place to hang out, but I understand it's gone downhill in the past few years. That might explain why this is a day shot and not a night shot.

The Big Picture

I wanted to emphasize how far away I was from the launch pad for the shuttle launch Friday. In this single shot, you can see the vehicle assembly building on the right (behind a small island in the Banana River), launch pad 39B is at the extreme left and pad 39A, the one from which the shuttle launched, is left of center. Trust me, they are there. I know they are nearly impossible to see, but that's the way it looks from 11 miles away.

Can anybody see the picture above? I could when I posted this last night, but now it's gone... Hmmm, looks like it never posted to Blogger. Should be better now. Sorry about that.

VAB

Here's another shot from my trip to the Kennedy Space Center. The most obvious thing on the horizon from where we were was the vehicle assembly building, where they mate the shuttle to the external fuel tank and the solid rocket boosters. This building holds various records for being big and tall and whatnot, but the coolest thing about it is the fact that it's so big and open, it has it's own internal weather. Imagine that. Oh, and I spent some time on Google Earth figuring out where I was in relation to all the action. Turns out I was 11 miles from the launch pad. That's a long way...

Atlantis

As promised, here are some pictures from yesterday's trip to the launch of the space shuttle Atlantis. We were on a causeway leading over to Merritt Island, which means we were a long way from the launch pad. So far that you couldn't actually see much of anything. The entire time prior to the launch, I was convinced the shuttle was on the pad shown above. So most of my pictures prior to the actual launch are focused on that pad. I didn't realize my mistake until seconds after launch, when I couldn't see anything through the lens. Turns out the shuttle was on the pad shown below. Look close, and you can see a little bit of the brown external fuel tank through the gantry. Live and learn, I guess.


I recovered pretty quickly, and caught the shuttle right after it had cleared most of the superstructure. Most of the white smoke you see is actually steam, from water dumped under the shuttle as the solid rocket boosters are firing. You can see the water tower to the left. Compare the view of the shuttle above to the one below, and you can pretty clearly see how it's rotating as it heads for space.

Yesterday

I just got back from a day trip to the East coast of Florida. Wanna guess why? More pictures tomorrow, err, I mean later today, after I've slept for a few hours...

A Bad Sign?

Maybe it's just me, but I thought it was pretty funny last night when I spotted this vulture perched atop a cross on the Greek Orthodox Church down the road. Just struck me as odd...

The Month Of June-Part 2

A couple more monthly pictures here for you, this time from my CD-sized calendar. Sharp-eyed readers with good memories might recognize these pictures, since the CD calendars recycle pictures from old full-sized calendars. But maybe these are new to you. The shot above is the Soldiers And Sailors Memorial in downtown Cleveland, Ohio. This picture doesn't really do it justice, as this thing is big! The shot below is one of my all-time favorite. I got incredibly lucky with the bird in full glide and the pier in the background. I shot this many years ago, and it was one of the pictures that really inspired me to go out and try to shoot birds more often. The bird in this instance is a great blue heron, and that pier in the background is the Anna Maria City Pier on Anna Maria Island in Florida. If you look really, really close, you might be able to see the Sunshine Skyway in the background way out at the horizon.

The Month Of June-Part 1

It's already the 4th day of June, and I'm just now getting my calendar pages up for the month. Oh, well. I'm lazy, I guess. Plus my refrigerator is broken, so I can't have cold food. But that's neither here nor there. What is here (and there) are a couple of great shots from my monthly calendar. The picture above is the yacht basin in downtown Bradenton, FL, on the Manatee River. The building in the background is a fancy restaurant, The Twin Dolphin. I've never eaten there, although I did go in once with the intention of eating. As soon as I saw the prices, I got up and left. The picture below is a building in downtown Cleveland, OH, called 55. I assume that's the street number or something, but I'm not sure. Look close at the upper right corner and you can see the big 55 emblazoned on it. The reflection is the more famous building across the street, Terminal Tower. I hear it's featured in Spiderman 3, but I don't remember seeing it.

Near The Beginning Of June

The calendar page for the week shows some rather stunning storm clouds forming opposite a sunset. The sun is to the left in this shot, rapidly approaching the horizon. You can see where only the tops of these clouds are being illuminated. Just for the record, this is the lake right out behind my condo. Just goes to show you that you don't have to travel far to get good pictures.

June 2007 AB (After Barry)

The very first day of hurricane season, and we get a storm. Well, the storm formed on the first day, we got hit the second day. Nothing much, really, just a bit of rain and some wind. But the wind was all coming from off-shore, which made for a particularly high tide. I made it out to the beach not long after high tide, and there was an ocean of water trying to get out of Sarasota Bay anyway it could. I got lucky and caught this unlucky snake above as he was whisked out into the gulf under a bridge. I watched him as long as I could, but he didn't make it to land. There were some surfers taking advantage of some large waves that he was headed towards, but I didn't get to see anything exciting happen.

This spit of land is usually a couple feet out of the water, even at high tide. As you can see, it's being overrun with the water. Oddly enough, most of this sand was washed up during one of the hurricanes back in 2004. It will be interesting to see how much remains after this weekend.

One of my favorite waterfront houses is this little house with the big dock on Longboat Pass. Look close and you can see that the water wasn't far from covering the dock and the porch. This is why, as much as I may like the house, I could never bring myself to live in such a place. No sirree, Bob!

Two Days In June

There's a little tiny bit of June that falls into this week, so you get a bonus calendar page. This shot comes from Las Vegas, which is one of the few cities in the world that boasts a volcano on the main drag. In this case, it's in front of the Mirage and it erupts hourly. A bonus is the giant ad for the then-new All You Need Is Love musical featuring the music of The Beatles in the background.

The Green Monster

Well, since the fans of The Kingston Trio liked my picture from yesterday of their building, I thought I'd give you another one tonight. Except this is a night view from the same day as the previous picture. Pretty cool, eh? Don't forget that this shot is four years old. I don't know if this building still looks like this or not. I'll know in three weeks, though.

Movin' On Up

No doubt many of you have forgotten that I am on my way to California in three weeks. In fact, three weeks from right now, I will be on the ground, camera in hand, thinking "How can these people afford to live out here?". Watch and see. Anyhow, these pictures are from my trip out four years ago, and they all feature me looking up at something in San Francisco. I'm from Florida, where everything is flat. And I'm from the sticks, where all the buildings are small. So one thing that caught my eye in SF was tall buildings and things on hills. The first shot above is the statue of Christopher Columbus in front of Coit Tower. Beautiful view, but I remember having to climb 10,000 steps just to get to the top of the hill where they built the tower. Thankfully you got to take an elevator once you got in the tower.

Look, it's a big green building! I didn't know the history of this building at the time, I just thought it looked neat. Turns out to be the home of "the hungry i", a nightclub in the 60's that was home to many, many folks artists and comedians in the bay area. I've got quite a few albums that were recorded here, including several by The Kingston Trio who once owned the building. I think Francis Ford Coppola owns it now. (Not Scorsese as I originally posted. I'm an idiot...)

If you visit SF for very long, a trip to Alcatraz is obligatory. I don't know if I'll need to go again on this trip though. I don't think it changes very much out there. This is the water tower on the edge of the exercise yard.

Last but not least, this is the Transamerica Pyramid, an internationally recognized symbol of San Francisco. It's most impressive from the base. I don't think you can get inside it, though. I'll have to give it a try again, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

An Update

Well, I updated the template for the blog tonight. Not a big difference, but there's a much shorter list of old posts now. I think it's a little bit easier to sort through the older stuff now, too. I'd seen other blogs that had the easier history, and finally figured out how to do it. I'm not going to make any big changes, but I've still got a few little things I want to do. Like maybe add some big flashing banner ads to bring in a little extra cash. Ha-ha, just kidding. Maybe...

The Last Few Days Of May

Here's a calendar photo for the last bit of May. This is one of the aerobatic teams I saw at the Sun-N-Fun show last year. These guys just did amazing things in the sky.

Oodles Of Doodles CCXXXVII

I've got a great doodle for you tonight from Floyd Cramer-Hello Blues (RCA Victor LSP-2151, 1960). Check it out! Some cats are really diggin' the sounds comin' from that jukebox. I'm going to assume that it's just a coincidence that he appears do be doing the moonwalk more than 20 years before Michael invented it. Oh, don't miss the signature on this one, Mozelle Thompson. That name has popped up here more than once. An added bonus is the ID tag from the front, Swinging Blues For Boppers. Righteous!

Full Speed Into May

This week's calendar picture is a shot from one of the pace laps immediately preceding last year's Daytona 500. You can see the weather was pretty poor, but I still got a few decent shots. You can't tell from the picture, but that Corvette leading the actual race cars is being driven by Jay Leno. No lie!

Limp

Here's another slightly rare bird I spotted this weekend. This is a limpkin, for those of you that might not recognize him. I think I've only spotted these guys three or four times. They're difficult to spot, due to the coloration of their feathers. This was certainly the largest one I'd ever seen, and I watched him for quite a while.

Pretty Bird, Pretty Bird

I thought you might like to see the bird I spotted Saturday. He was up in Lakeland at Lake Hollingsworth. I know that probably doesn't mean anything to most of you, but some of you will appreciate it. What is it? Well, I thought it was an ordinary moorhen, but once it got closer, I was rather shocked by the coloration. This is a purple gallinule. They have to be in just the right light to get all that color, though. In the shade, they're just plain old ordinary black, although they do still have stat light purple spot on their heads. There were plenty of these at the lake, although I don't know how common they are in other areas. This one was looking for a handout, which he would carry back to 4 babies he (or she) was taking care of. Not the most ecologically sound method of child rearing, but it seemed to be working.

When In Daytona

Next time I come to Daytona, I think I want to stay here instead of at a plain old ordinary Hampton Inn.

Oodles Of Doodles CCXXXVI

Another quick doodle for you tonight, this time from a Columbia Records inner sleeve. Not sure of the year, but there is no mention of stereo. There is, however, a long boring paragraph about Variable Groove, a trick to increase the playing time on records. They brag about fitting 65 minutes of music onto a single 12" record. I bet that sounded great... Anyhow, the doodles you see are part of the little illustrations from the different sections on the sleeve. The top drawing illustrates "Music By The Hour", the one below is "Columbia High Fidelity" and the one at the bottom is "Take Care Of Your Records", but you know that because I didn't edit out the text. I always like these little guides that tell you how to handle your records. And yes, these were printed in blue! How cool is that? (There's a signature in there next to the guy's left foot, but I can't make anything out.)

This sleeve was inside Martyn Green With Lehman Engel Conducting The Columbia Operetta Chorus And Orchestra-Martyn Green's Gilbert & Sullivan (Columbia Masterworks ML 4643, 1953). So maybe 1953 is our date. That's awfully early. Somewhere I've seen records on Columbia that proclaim something about the tenth anniversary of the LP. I'm going to have to find one of those and see what the date it.

Oodles Of Doodles CCXXXV

Here's a doodle for you from really late in the game. In case you don't recognize them, this is Ferrante & Teicher from The ABC Collection (ABC AC-30013, 1976). This doodle actually appears on the inner sleeve, but it's visible through the die-cut outer jacket. Sort of an interesting cubist take on the piano duo here. I couldn't read the signature, but the liner notes credit the illustration to John Casado from Casado Design, Ltd. I've featured a doodle from F&T before, and I can only remember one other doodle from the seventies. (Nope, I was wrong. Two, errr, three...) By this time, it was cheap enough to print full-color sleeves, mostly illustrated with pictures, so the ultra-cheap-to-print doodles had gone the way of the 78.

Frank, Frankie, Frankest

I thought I had enough Frank Ortega music to last me a lifetime. I shared out his great 77 Sunset Strip (featuring Sy Oliver) LP with you a while back, then more recently I gave you a second LP, Swingin' Abroad, that wasn't quite as good. Imagine my shock when I stumbled across this third LP last week. It's in a sleeve that's closer to paper than cardboard, and I almost flipped past it for that very reason. But something made me look, and there it was. Turns out that this is a Canadian pressing, which helps explain the odd sleeve. It's pretty straightforward piano noodling, so you might not enjoy it if that doesn't sound like your cup of tea. This one actually predates those other albums by quite a bit. But if you're a completist, then you know you need to download Frankie Ortega And His Group-The Piano Styling Of Frankie Ortega (Imperial LP 9025, 1956).

Oodles Of Doodles CCXXXIV

I hate to do this to you, but I have to share the worst doodle ever with you tonight. From the flip side to Glenn Miller And His Orchestra-The Golden Hits From His Original Soundtracks (20th Fox Fox 1001, 1961), this is rough. I think I could have drawn something better than this, and I'm certainly no artist. I wouldn't have shared it at all, except for the picture below that came from the front cover. It's Glenn's band for '41 and '42. Look close on the upper left and you'll see Billy May! I had no idea that he played with Glenn Miller. I suppose the things I don't know could easily fill more than one book, but there are things I really should know. Ray Anthony is in there, too, but he doesn't impress me so much as Billy.

Harp Interlude

Those of you who enjoyed the Hi-Fi Living series will want to download this one just for the memories of those harp interludes, the rest of you need to download it for other, more esoteric reasons. There are parts of this album that sound like your typical late fifties mood music, and there are other parts of this that just don't sound like what you expect when you see the harp on the cover. You've heard Gene Bianco here on the blog before doing Christmas tunes, but this experiment in harpistry precedes that experience by a few years. Note the credit for Mundell Lowe as a supporting player. (Remind me when Christmas rolls around that I have something from Mr. Lowe to share.) Other contributors that are less well credited include Joe Venuto (from the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra!), Don Lamond (From Woody Herman's Herd) and Wendell Marshall (Duke Ellington sideman). How can you go wrong with a group like that? So have I got you interested yet? Be my guest and download Gene Bianco And His Group Featuring Mundell Lowe-Harp, Skip & Jump (RCA Camden CAL-452, 1958). You'll be glad you did.

The Middle Of May

The calendar picture this week is a shot of the drawbridge over Longboat Pass which connects Anna Maria Island to Longboat Key. That's a white egret in the foreground. You can't tell it from this picture, but their feet are bright yellow. It stands in sharp contrast to their black legs. I'm not sure if I had a point here, but if I did, it's long gone now...

Oodles Of Doodles CCXXXIII

Here are a great pair of doodles for you. Well, the car is actually a photograph, but the doodle part didn't make any sense if it wasn't in there. There's actually a credit for the car on the LP sleeve! It says "Sport Car: The Austin-Healey 100", and there's another picture of it on the front of the LP. You can tell it's the same couple in the picture below, or at least the same guy. Look close and you'll see he's wearing the same hat in both drawings. These wonderful doodles both come from the flip side of Andre Previn-Let's Get Away From It All (Decca DL 8131, 1955). This is certainly the first doodle from Previn, and one of only a handful from the Decca label. Exciting stuff, isn't it?

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there! Here's a special little treat for you from your Uncle Miltie. Don't worry, he doesn't sing on any of these tracks. There's a little bit of narration on three of the tracks, but other than that, he lets the professionals do their job. If your mother remembers seeing Milton on television, then she'll enjoy the tunes from Milton Berle Conducts His Orchestra And Chorus-Songs My Mother Loved (Roulette R-25018, 1958). Now go call your mommy.