Somewhere in Texas

I spent the weekend recently traveling around Northwestern Texas with my best friend looking for ghost towns. Since he is a wonderful photographer and I've been wanting to learn for a long time, I began what I like to call the "stop taking crappy photos with the point and shoot" project.

I learned all sorts of things about photography in general, and took my Canon SD600 and played around with the manual settings. This of course produced much nicer pictures than my Auto setting has ever turned out.

So....here they are. I'm hoping to get some honest feedback. I'm specifically interested in how to take better photos of people. I really prefer living things to objects.

Big Yellow Taxi

Isn't it amazing how much the landscape changes over time? When first working at the U, I would ride along on the #2 bus and, through the plexi-glass windows, be updated of the various construction projects going on. As I started biking to work, I would miss the daily progress reports and find myself stunned at how a building had replaced a parking lot in just a few short months.

More recently, I had been watching the Midtown Greenway bridge being built on strolls down Hwy 55. No longer taking that route, I was surprised to see that I missed the grand opening.

So, here it is: Minnesota's first cable-stayed bridge, the Midtown Greenway Bridge. It's an amazing design and I hope next spring to take a ride over it.




On more of a function, biking note.... I have often pondered biking to work (on my bicycle, not the motorbike). There are a variety of reasons why I haven't done it yet, but my greatest concern was bad weather. Turns out Minneapolis has a pretty cool program where, if you bike to work often, you can get vouchers for an emergency ride if needed. I guess this is what you get when you live in the 2nd best biking city in the nation.

Everything you could ever want to know about biking in Minneapolis

Flip Your Wig

This evening when deciding between the two films,
The Boondock Saints and The Heiress,

          

I asked my roommate how we should come to a decision. He said, "Can't you find a website and flip a coin or something"

My response: "If I can find a website where you can flip a coin, I'm not only going to use it, I'm going to blog about it"

Lo and behold, random.org. Not only can you randomly flip things, you can generate integers & fraction, roll a die, and even do a lottery quick pick. For the math nerd in us all (or perhaps only me) it's a statistic random dream come true. Or maybe it's just a dream for those of us too lazy to flip an actual coin. *cough*

Being that you can choose what things to flip, I opted for the good ol' US Quarter: State Issue Georgia.

Heads won and we watched The Boondock Saints.

Limb By Limb

Everyone in the world probably knows about this girl, however, being that I do not watch television, I think I'm a bit behind. I came to a complete stop upon seeing her image on CNN on the lobby television at work. Lakshmi Tatma was born with a headless conjoined twin, and underwent surgery to remove the additional limbs and have her pelvis re-constructed.

An x-ray below shows an extended spine and additional limbs, which have a sort of mirror effect.


I was very excited to see today that the surgery to remove her "additional limbs" was a success. Sometimes, nature and science are both truly amazing.

Never Gonna Give You Up

Just because this actually made me laugh out loud. Thanks Nin. I so love 80's guilty pleasures

Sweetness and Light

Yesterday my roommate, a friend, and I braved the Mall of America in order to indulge in the sensory overload known as Lush. For those who are unfamiliar, Lush is a soap and cosmetics store that has now arrived in the Twin Cities.

Lush is known for their bath bombs and most notably, for their vegan and vegetarian friendly soaps. For those of you who were not in attendance in my AP O-Chem class in high school, you may be interested to know that most of your commercial "soaps" are in fact technically detergents.

I kept my purchase to a measly $8 with this Coalface soap, while my roommate was slightly more indulgent; dropping just shy of $100.

I have to say, I think the place is pretty fun and you have to feel good knowing that your products are animal free. They are located in the 1st floor Macy's cosmetics center at the Mall of America.

Such Great Heights

Does anyone else find it somewhat ironic that the soundtrack to the latest round of UPS commercials is done by the Postal Service?

Welcome To The Jungle

I have always thought that my secondary blog would be hosted by me. Perhaps I'll have the time someday to actually build it. After blogging at LiveJournal since February 2002, it's a little odd using a new interface. That's almost 6 years of pure random emotion on the internets. Along with my *crosses fingers* new mac book purchase to come, seems only right to make the change to something more creative and less self focused. Here is to expressing something new.