Upskirt

Here's something you may not know. When you visit the Statue Of Liberty, you can go into the museum located in the base of the structure, and climb to the top of it. The top of the base, that is, not the top of the statue. And the day I went, you actually had to climb. The elevator was out, so I walked up a dozen or more flights of stairs. At the top, there's a ranger, and he explains that you can no longer climb into the bowels of liberty, so to speak, but there are four spots on the floor where you can stand and look through glass panels, up the skirt of Lady Liberty. So these four shots are what you see if you stand in those four spots. You can see the ladder that leads up to the crown. You can see the iron structure that was designed by the same fellow who did the Eiffel Tower. You can see the copper skin that's held in place by hundreds of iron straps, each intricately shaped to match the copper, not the other way around. (Well, they used to be iron. After the restoration in the 1980's spearheaded by Lee Iaccoca, most of the original iron bars were replaced one at a time by stainless steel replicas.) Anyhow, I thought it was pretty fantastic. She is as pretty on the inside as on the outside, and what woman doesn't want to be the same way?

Red Bead-N-Rice

There are so many little things wrong with this sign, I just don't know where to begin. Pretty sure this is where I ate at last year's Tropical Heatwave, too. I don't remember it being all that good, I'm afraid. So much potential, though. The thought of a smoked tomato is making me hungry as I type this, and I don't even smoke! But smoked wing? That sounds like the reason they canceled that one plane at the airshow.

Merry Christmas, It's April

Quite often, I take pictures with the intent of using them for something later. And almost as often, I forget all about it when the time comes. In this case, I spotted the message above chiseled into a sidewalk in Ybor City (the entertainment district of Tampa, FL) while I was attending Tropical Heatwave in 2008. I intended to share it with you at some point during the Christmas festivities last year, but it slipped my mind and I never did. But I remembered it today, and here it is, four months too late for last year and eight months too early for this year. But this might help me to remember that Tropical Heatwave is coming up again this year sometime next month. I wonder who's playing this year?

Another Demilio Sighting

Some months ago (OK, over a year), I scanned this LP cover because it features a couple of different Demilio covers. Just pictures of other covers, actually, but they are still recognizable as Demilio's, so I wanted to bring them to every one's attention. The LP you're looking at here is Edmundo Ros And His Orchestra-Standards...In The Latin Manner (London LL 1466). The two LPs you see on that ladies lap (and which appear to be pretty close to hitting the floor) are Ros Album Of Sambas and Latin Melodies, both also by Edmundo Ros. I don't think I've shown you either of these exact records before, but I did share the same picture that's on one of them. I've brought you at least one other cover that features pictures of other Demilio albums, but it only featured one Demilio among the LPs spread out on the floor.

The cover above is actually from the Ros LP Sambas!, but it's the same Demilio art as Ros Album Of Sambas. When you've got art this cool, why use it only once? I'll have to see if I can dig up that Latin Melodies cover.

(If you have no idea who I'm talking about when I speak of this Demilio, then search my humble blog and you'll find out what little I know of him. You'll get to see some pretty great artwork, too!)

Airfest 2009-Ditto

One of the things I look forward to at these airshows is the performance of Ditto. Ditto is no ordinary stunt airplane. Sure, he does the same aerobatic maneuvers as many of the other planes at the show, and he leaves a smoke trail like many of the other planes, but the smoke itself is what's different. It's somehow more cohesive than whatever the other planes emit, and it comes from the wingtips, not the exhaust. So as he flies through the air, he leaves intricate patterns. And those patterns aren't static, they don't just tell you where he flew or what sort of pattern he's flying. The smoke seems to come alive, twisting and turning in the turbulence left behind by the plane. It's amazing to watch and very hard to photograph. I've had to work on all these pictures to make them a little bit presentable, but they are still only an approximation of what you would see if you were there. Often, the two smoke trails converge in two spots, then split apart into rings. Whenever Ditto spots one of these rings, he tries to fly back through it. Even though the wind was high at Airfest this year, he still managed to thread the needle quite a few times. The shots above and below show him as he approaches a ring and flies through it.


These two shots just show some of the amazing formations left behind as Ditto flies around. Try to imagine these serpentine smoke trails in motion as they twist and turn in the sky above. It's amazing!

Airfest 2009-Toys!

I know, I know, it looks like a bunch of toys on a table. But I took this shot for a reason. See that plane in the middle? That's a P-38. I've never seen a real P-38 at an airshow, and I really want to. One of my goals is to make it to a warbird airshow sometime soon and see one of those in the flesh, both on the ground and in the air. Back in high school, I wrote my senior thesis on the history of automotive tailfins, and there was a large prologue in there about how the design head of GM at the time saw a P-38 prototype during the war, and it influenced his design of postwar automobiles. Those dual tail rudders from the P-38 morphed into dual tailfins on the back of a Cadillac, and it was all uphill from there. So anyhow, that's my story behind taking this picture. I take thousands of pictures, and very few of them have stories.

Not Long Now

I've been out all day, taking pictures up at Hillsborough River State Park. I should have been here at home working on posts for the next week, but I couldn't resist. I did get some nice shots, though, so you'll be seeing some of those pictures in and amongst the 100 posts I intend to make this coming week. I counted up the shots I've made with my current camera, a Canon digital Rebel XSi that I got last May. In less than a year of shooting, I've averaged over 100 pictures a day with it! Now, there are plenty of days I don't go shooting, sometimes I won't take a single picture for a week or more. But when I go out to shoot, I shoot a lot. Like this squirrel above. I got five pictures of him in a very similar pose. Two of them showed him looking straight at the camera. I could have shown you either one of those, but I chose this one at random. It took all of those pictures to get the one I like. And that's why I take so many pictures, to get one I like. I think it's worth it. See you tomorrow!

Giving It Some Thought

So, I'm thinking about trying something challenging here at the blog. I've been neglecting it somewhat for a while now, only posting a third of what I have in past years, so I'd like to do a little something to help get back on track. I'm thinking of a marathon blogging week, beginning this Sunday. My goal is to make 100 posts between Sunday morning at 12:01 AM and Saturday Night at midnight. Not easy, but not impossible. I know I've got dozens of pictures I should have posted before, but never did, and I've got some record stuff I want to throw up, too. So I think tonight I'm going to start writing up some posts, but not publishing them until Sunday, and see how many I can get up in the next week. Back during Christmas I've posted over 50 items in a week, so 100 is a big stretch. And I'm going to try to shy away from silly novelty text-only posts. No one is going to visit the blog to see what I think of the day's news, that's for sure. Wish me luck, and I'll see you on Sunday!

Helpful Advice

Many of you have written in to Ernie (Not Bert) and asked what you can do to stop rampant train theft. I guess in some parts of the country, it's just not safe to leave your steam locomotive parked on the tracks while you duck into Wal-Mart for a few minutes, even if you bring your coal in with you. But what can you do? Well, how about the new and improved Chock-O-Matic? This little device works much like a boot for your car, only it locks up the main drive wheels of your locomotive tighter than a drum, keeping the bad guys from riding off in your steam-powered, 80,000 pound, 80 year old locomotive. Call today for more information!

Airfest 2009-Six At A Go

I've been meaning to post this shot for you since the night of Airfest, but I've been lazy. I think this is the best picture I've ever taken of the Thunderbirds, and I've shot them three times now I think. The light is pretty good (although not perfect) but the composition is awesome. All six planes in formation, with the the top one just beginning to break out and roll off towards me, letting the sun light it up so that it stands out from the others. The number six plane at the bottom is also starting to roll out of formation away from me, showing you the full paint scheme of the underside. This one may turn out to be a calendar shot, watch and see!

Baby Birdies

I walked out of the shop this morning and spotted something a little out of the ordinary on the cell tower across the street. It took some close watching, but I finally decided that there were two juvenile bald eagles perched up there. The shot above is the best one I got, and it's enhanced quite a bit. I don't think this will make the calendar, but it's something you don't see every day.

Lookee, lookee who came back later in the day? Only one of them this time, and not in the best spot to get a picture, but at least the light was much better.

Time To Wash The Thunderbird

So, it's Saturday morning, and you want to take the Thunderbird out for a spin this afternoon. What do you do? Why, wash and wax it, of course!

Meanwhile, Back At The Airshow

Did I tell you I saw the US Air Force Thunderbirds at Airfest Saturday? Yep, and they were impressive, as usual!

Airfest 2009-Threesome

Well, someone commented asking if the picture I posted last night of the two planes in flight together was a composite. It's not, and neither is this one, a fly-by with three planes! This is the ever-popular Heritage Flight, where they get current Air Force planes to play with vintage Air Force and Army Air Corps planes. It's always a stunning sight to see these jets in formation with prop driven planes that were made sixty years ago. The prop is pushing as fast as it can go, and the jet engines are throttled back to something close to stall speed to make this flight possible. But it's awfully impressive.

Airfest 2009-B1

Here're a couple shots of the B1 that flew over Airfest yesterday. The first pass was the one above, with the wings at their fully extended position. The second pass below shows the wings tucked in, which I think is for faster flight, when this baby goes full throttle. They flew this plane in from Texas just to make these two passes. Then they flew off to another airshow going on somewhere else. (One possible destination was Pensacola, where I think they had an airshow featuring the Blue Angels.)

Airfest 2009-There's Still Time

I just got home from Airfest 2009 at Macdill Air Force Base up in Tampa. Got some great shots that I hope to share with you soon (and a spot on my lens or image sensor that I need to fix...) The show continues tomorrow, but it's supposed to rain the morning. So if airplanes like this make you get all excited, head up there once the rain stops. You won't regret it. And it's free!

E-Who?

Yes, it's an emu. A large flightless bird, only slightly smaller than an ostrich. Caught this guy at Big Cat Habitat this weekend. He looks a little unkempt and/or mean, but he was a nice guy, eating corn from the hands of little kids. I think he's giving me the eyeball because I didn't feed him anything.

Lions And Tigers And Bears, Again

As I just mentioned, I journeyed out to a big cat rescue place this weekend that I had heard of but never visited. I don't know why I'd never been there, since it's only a few miles from my house, but I hadn't. It's called Big Cat Habitat And Gulf Coast Sanctuary. They're a little more oriented towards the circus show animals than my usual cat place, but they still have a lot of impressive animals, and they do a little show with them, to show you what some of these animals are capable of. The first big cat I saw when I got there is this lioness, just chilling out in her own private swimming pool. She didn't seem to have a care in the world, all the tourists with their cameras walking by, and she's not paying us a bit of mind.

Up next was this tiger, rolling around on his back with his tongue hanging out, again, not a care in the world, just enjoying the life of Riley in the sanctuary.

And finishing up the Oh, My! trio is this bear, hanging out in his huge bear pool. Sorry about all the fencing between the camera and the animals, but they have to do something to keep us paparazzi safe.

Non-Jewish Goats

I visited a new big cat sanctuary this weekend, but before I show you any of the big cats, or the bears or the emus or camels or raccoons or monkeys or even the lemurs, I wanted to show you one of their goats. Isn't he just the cutest little thing? I just thought he was a cute little goatling (or kid, I guess they're called), but the sign below let me know that this is actually a gentile goat. I didn't know they came in different religions, did you? (Insert your own non-PC joke here, I'm not gonna do it...)

Little Green Birdies

Well, I tried for a couple of hours last night to post some content to the old blog, but Picassa just wouldn't cooperate. She seems to be a little more agreeable tonight, so let me see how much of my weekend I can share with you before she conks out again. I had stopped in front of the public library on Fruitville Saturday morning to take some pictures of a giant book (which you may or may not see later) when I heard the incessant chatter of quaker parrots. I'm always hearing these guys, but they're difficult to see and even harder to shoot because of their green coloration and rather reclusive behavior. So I got really lucky when I caught this pair working on a new nest. You can see both of them above, checking out the interior, and just one of them below, weaving some new sticks onto the outside. And all the way at the bottom is one of the pair just hanging out, waiting for just the right time to take off on a new stick gathering mission. These guys are not native here, but there are dozens if not hundreds of wild flocks around here, eating all sorts of natural foods and making tons of noise. But it's pretty neat to have wild parrots flying around, noisy or not!

The First Four Are The Easiest

2471 posts ago, I started my blog on this day back in 2005. So unlike most of the blogs out there that don't seem to last more than a year or two, this one is four years old. I can remember the day I started it. I had gotten back from Sanibel Island the week before with a camera full of pictures that I didn't know what to do with. It took me a bit of doing, but I finally figured out how to share them with the world via a blog. I've come a long way since then. In that time I've shown you planes, trains and automobiles, lions, tigers and bears (Oh, My!), and let's see, all sorts of other things. I've been to New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Cleveland, Atlanta, Charlotte, Chicago, Los Angeles (for about 20 hours) and umpteen cities here in Florida. (Where will I go next? You'll see...) I've seen more birds than you can shake a stick at, I think the only one I really still need to see in the wild is a cara cara. For a long time, I couldn't find any bald eagles in the wild, but I've seen three (no, four) in the past month, so I've got that under control. I've brought you doodles from over three hundred musty old albums, and I've shared the music from literally hundreds of full albums with you, albeit most of them during Christmas. I am pretty proud to be the only place I know of on the internet to bring you the For Hi-Fi Living series, released way back in 1957 and re-released by me 50 years later. Christmas has always been a big deal here, both in December and July. I slacked off this last year quite a bit, but in previous years I've posted more than 250 items between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's enough that I've been called Santa Claus on more than one occasion. I'm skipping over plenty of things, like lighthouses and license plates, artworks both big and small, miscellaneous animals both big and small, more sunsets and beaches than you can shake a another stick at, some alligators both real and plush, and who knows what else, it's been a long four years. (Wait, can't forget my cat...space shuttles...fire works...the moon) Anyhow, I just wanted to make a little notice of my anniversary. Here's to the past four years, and to forty more!

Old Glory

While killing time yesterday, I shot some pictures of the flag that was in front of the snack bar in the little park I waited for the shuttle launch in. I was looking right into the sun through a long lens, just hoping that the wind didn't let up and the flag drop. That wouldn't have been good for my eye. But it didn't, so I got these neat shots of Old Glory, flapping in the breeze with some cool washed-out colors. I like 'em.

One More Bald Eagle

Hard to believe but I spotted one more rare bird while in Titusville for the shuttle launch. There were dozens of ospreys around while I was shooting, and I'd pretty much been ignoring them. But something caught my eye about one that just didn't look right, and sure enough, it turned out to be a bald eagle. He was pretty much out of range, but I still squeezed off a couple of blurry shots. Don't judge me too harshly on them, I was just happy to see a bald eagle.


What I didn't expect after spotting the eagle was to see an osprey start giving him a hard time. Twice he came after the eagle in mid-air, and twice the eagle did some incredible flying to show the osprey who was boss. It's a little tough to see in these photos, but that's the osprey on top and the eagle on bottom, flying upside down to go after the osprey with his talons. I kept hoping he'd fly back by, but I never saw him again after this pass.

Kingfishing

While waiting for the shuttle launch, I wandered all over the place. You have to get there early to get a parking spot, then you're left with all kind of time to kill. So I wandered. One of the first things I found was a kingfisher. This is only the second one I've ever shot, so it's pretty special. I never did get very close to him, so I was lucky to get these halfway decent pictures.

More Discovery

Here are a few more pictures from the shuttle launch yesterday. I drove the three hours over there, and it took me over six hours to drive home, so I guess I need to get as much mileage as possible out of these pictures. The shot above shows the shuttle to the left and the two solid rocket boosters after separation on the left. The two SRBs are actually falling into the Atlantic Ocean at the point, but Shuttle Discovery is continuing to move off into space. The curvature of the Earth is what makes it look like it's moving downward. This was probably the longest I've ever watched the shuttle after the launch. I read later that it was visible for more than seven minutes, and was as far north at New Jersey before it winked out of sight.

And three more pictures of that awesome smoke trail. I'm afraid none of my pictures really do it justice. It was just incredible, the way it caught the light and became more and more distorted as the upper level winds twisted it into a pretzel.

Discovery Is Go

Perhaps you heard there was a shuttle launch yesterday. Space Shuttle Discovery blasted off at 7:43 PM on it's way to the International Space Station, and I was there. It was about 15 minutes after sunset, so it was still pretty light out. But the light from that solid rocket fuel made everything else in the picture seem dark as night. Someday I'll get good at taking these pictures. I suspect that'll be right around the time they end the shuttle program.

I was well-enough prepared this time that I was able to slap on a shorter lens soon after take-off. So you get to see something other than a long tongue of flame behind an invisible shuttle.

I mentioned that the launch took place just after sunset. Not long into flight, the smoke plume entered the area where the suns' rays were still in the orange sunset color. Past that, the full illumination of the sun turned the trail a brilliant white, so it was quite possibly the most colorful shuttle launch ever.

This detail of the smoke trail in the area where the most color was shows the beautiful colors that are usually reserved for sunsets in some island nation you only ever get to visit once in your life.