Road Trip

Posted by dkrashb on April 28, 2013

Gina looking fierce in front of unwanted graffiti

Loading the car for a road trip used to be simple. It was a matter of throwing in a small bag with some clean underwear, a change of clothes, maybe some special face soap, and, of course, my purse. Now, it takes a whole lot more.

This would be a little more timeless without the sunglasses

There’s the additional wardrobe required for business meetings. This, of course, must be accompanied by additional baggage required for a laptop, a phone, a tablet, 3 chargers, headphones, business cards, and miscellaneous forms of paper.

Then there’s the additional wardrobe required for hanging out with friends and encountering a variety of social settings. Limiting myself to 2 pairs of shoes is quite a challenge.

This reminds me of the kinds of photos my grandparents used to take

But the mass of what I loaded into the car was photography equipment. It took two big bags of stuff plus my tripod–that’s without my umbrella stands. Had I brought Tisen with me, the volume of stuff would have doubled. Fortunately, my husband is taking care of Tisen for a few days and we’ll meet up later.

I managed to get the car loaded in one trip with my husband’s help.

I like driving. At least, I like it until miscellaneous body parts start going numb, my shoulders start burning, and I realize I’m clenching my jaw like I’m performing one of those rope tricks in a circus where a lady is spun and swung all over the place while she bites on a rope. Then, I would like a more comfortable seat and perhaps a massage.

I keep thinking I should make the drive at a leisurely pace, stopping to shoot interesting sights and exploring the area each time I stop. Unfortunately, I never have that kind of time to get from one place to another. This time, I opted to drive a few hours the night before I needed to arrive at my destination. Then, I stopped at a hotel for the night before driving the rest of the way. This divided the drive up nicely, allowing me to get a decent night’s sleep and also to miss rush hour traffic outside a major city in the morning. Had I not stopped, I would have needed to leave by 5AM to make sure I got to my meeting on time.

Gill and Gina looking strangely contemporary in this tintype-effect Hipstamatic shot

After doing my work stuff, I got to have some time to relax with my hosts, who we like to call Gina and Gill. It’s a beautiful sunny day for a change. Gina and Gill have the perfect porch for a sunny day. We ended up hanging out on said porch, enjoying the warmth and the breezes. I decided that the big front porch on their 100+ year old house was the perfect setting to pull out the Hipstamatic app and use the tintype film.

After taking a few shots of Gina and Gill on the front porch, Gina and I took a little walk where we found some unpleasant graffiti to shoot her in front of. I like the urban look.

Tuesday Night

Posted by dkrashb on April 27, 2013

Exactly how much stuff does it take for a road trip when I decide to take my DSLR?

Every Tuesday we eat the same thing. This is our way of simplifying. We have 3 nights a week when we always eat the same thing. Or, as close to the same thing as a given restaurant gets. It always surprises me how much variability there can be from one week to the next between the way a meal is made.

There are times I like surprises and then there are times I want my food to be utterly predictable. Food items like pizza should be predictable, in my opinion. I have never picked a favorite pizza joint on the basis of how frequently the way the pizza tastes changes. Yet, one of the things that probably keeps us from getting bored with our eating routine is that we cannot predict how the pizza will taste or how the sushi will be prepared from one week to the next.

This is especially true of the pizza. We usually eat Mellow Mushroom pizza having not found a mom and pop shop that we like yet. We like Mellow Mushroom pizza about half the time. The other half, it’s either over cooked, under cooked, or cold. I’ve always wanted to be a fly on the wall in the kitchen to figure out exactly what goes wrong half the time.

Food art at a nice restaurant on the road–a far cry from the sushi

Our Tuesday night choice is not pizza, however. It’s the Rice Boxx. This is a Chinese/Thai/Japanese place that has decent Chinese and sushi. I have found a couple of dishes I like, but I tire of them quickly. I have been ordering 1 shrimp tempura and 1 sweet potato roll every Tuesday night for months. The sushi is OK, but once again unpredictable. The thing that is predictable is that there will always be a surprise in the fortune cookies.

Sometimes it’s a missing fortune. Sometimes it’s a fortune that is a weather forecast instead of a fortune. Sometimes it’s the cookies themselves, which go from thicker to thiner styles and back again yet always come in the same wrapper.

On this particular Tuesday night, I was running around like a mad woman trying to pack for a road trip. I had decided at the last minute, after working late, to leave that night instead of the next morning so I could avoid hitting Knoxville during the morning rush hour. Pat went and picked up our food without me so I could finish packing.

I stopped running around like a mad woman long enough to sit down to eat when Pat returned. There was a new sushi chef and he made the sushi smaller and tighter, making it easier to get the pieces in my mouth without making a mess. When I finished my sushi, I opened up my fortune cookie, already smiling with anticipation as I tore open the wrapper.

Does this really count as a fortune?

This is what it said: “An alien of some sort will be appearing to your shortly.” I keep watching out for bright lights in the sky, but so far, nothing.

Crater Lake, the Second

Posted by dkrashb on March 18, 2013

Crater Lake really is almost this blue. Shot with the Color version of tintype “film” in Hipstamatic.

From Signal Point, we loaded back into our trusty min-van, found directions to Snoopers Rock on Google maps, and headed back down Signal Mountain to drive around the base along the Tennessee River. The drive was mostly beautifu–there were views of the river and the gorge much of the way.

Snoopers Rock is in the Prentice Cooper State Forest. It is not only not near Signal Point, it is not even on Signal Mountain (see yesterday’s post). But, it was a lovely day for a bit of exploring in any case.

The longest part of the drive was the gravel road from the entry to the park to the trailhead. We happened to arrive on a day when ATVs were over-running the place. We originally thought there must have been some kind of event there, but in retrospect, I suspect it’s just that popular to go driving around in an ATV here.

I’m not sure if I was shooting the plants in the water or plants above, but I kind of like the patch of sharpness in the midst of blur. Need to figure out which Hipstamatic lens does this

Along the way, we saw a sign for “Crater Lake.” Thinking of Crater Lake in Oregon, our curiosity was piqued and we decided to take yet another detour. We turned down a road that was clearly not designed for mini-vans. We drove slowly, going up and down bumps and through muddy puddles that spoke of the popularity of ATVs here.

We made it to a grassy parking area and I suggested we were at the lake, but Pat thought we needed to go further.

The road got bumpier, rootier, and muddier the further we went. Of course, we had no cell reception to try to figure out where we were, either. I had a vague feeling we were going in a loop, however, and suggested we turn around.

This one was shot with the Camera! App and was only slightly adjusted–this is what the lake actually looked like.

By this time, we all three needed to use the facilities. Having quite a bit of experience with natural facilities, I worked my way through a few brambles to a bit of cover from view of the roadway. I was glad I did when, just as I was finishing up, I heard an ATV approaching.

Pat was in the middle of turning the van around when I got back to the road. He was also dragging the bumper over the roots at the base of a tree. Fortunately, our van suffered more harm than the tree did. But, tree-hugger that I am, I yelled “Stop!” as soon as I saw the bumper drag on the roots. This was a good thing–I’m not sure our bumper would still be attached otherwise.

Pat posed for me in front of the lake.

We eventually made it back down the road in the direction we’d come. Although the couple on the ATV seemed to think we might be close to Crater Lake by going the opposite direction, neither Pat nor I thought trying to turn around again was a good idea. As we arrived back at the grassy parking area, from this direction, the lake was visible through some underbrush. We looked at each other and laughed. I managed not to say, “I told you so.”

Tisen wasn’t sure if he was hot enough to go wading in the strange looking water

Finding Fun

Posted by dkrashb on February 25, 2013

Pink clouds capture my attention when I glance out the window

We agreed to do something fun this weekend. However, we didn’t agree on what we would do. I, of course, wanted to go hiking. My husband, however, wanted to do something that wasn’t physical because his ankle has been bothering him. Given that I can’t argue with an injury, I contemplated what we could possibly do that would not be physically demanding, but that could include Tisen.

I suggested we take a drive to Atlanta to go to IKEA, something we had planned to do a month or so ago, but ended up not doing.

The pink streaks reach all the way to the view directly in front of us, which is almost due North

IKEA is one of those places that always sounds great to me. Lots of cool, clever, and affordable concepts to make a home more livable. And, we could use some shelving and lighting, etc. in our new place.

So, we loaded Tisen up in the car about mid-morning Saturday and off we went. The drive to Atlanta is not nearly as scenic as the drive to Nashville. There is no IKEA in Tennessee, however, so Atlanta was the closest choice. We made one stop for a fast-food lunch. It occurred to me that if we’re going to do a road trip, we should start planning our route based on enjoyable, healthier restaurants. It’s just no fun to eat fast food.

Once we made it to IKEA, by the time we found a parking spot and through the front door, I was ready for a nap. Have I mentioned I hate to shop? I don’t know why I always think going to IKEA is going to be fun. I’ve been to about 3 IKEAs now and I always have the same experience: I start out excited by the idea; then, as soon as we walk in the door, I feel exhausted and overwhelmed by choices. By the time we get about a quarter of the way through the first show room, I am practically shoving people out of the way because I can’t get through there fast enough.

The light eventually fades, leaving only a faint glow between the clouds and the ridge

The further we get into the store, the more my desire to leave increases. All I can think about it how much I don’t want to be there.

We did make it out of the store without inciting a riot. We immediately used my iPhone to find the closest park. We found a lovely little park in the middle of a nearby neighborhood and took Tisen for a loop around it. I felt human again afterwards.

Able to breathe again, we returned to the car and drove the nearly two hours back home.

We not only failed to do something fun, but we also ended up walking further than my husband intended.

On the plus side, we spent some quality time together in the car. And, later that day, there was a nice sunset partially viewable from our balcony.

I decided to do a short time lapse “video” of the clouds blowing through as the sun went down and the light faded away.

Tisen and his infamous purple monkey

Home Again

Posted by dkrashb on January 26, 2013

There’s a Golden Eagle perched in the Sycamore, but it was only visible through a scope

Perhaps you didn’t notice, but I was out of town for the past 3 days. It was a work thing. So, yes, another post with photos from the Sandhill Crane Festival. While I would like to have lots of cool pictures from the Atlanta Marquis Hotel (where I did not get to stay because it was full by the time travel approval came through, but I did spend at least 12 hours a day there), it just wasn’t a good time to be lugging around my giant camera and tripod.

Adult Bald Eagle

In fact, it wasn’t a good time to do anything. Had I not been staying 2 blocks away, I might not have seen daylight for 3 days. Several of us commented that we felt like we were in Vegas–no sense of time, confined to a conference center all day, moving from room to room, meeting to meeting, session to session, the only things missing were gambling and booze.

I did get to go out to dinner with some of the folks I work with whom I rarely get to see in person, which was great fun. But, of course, it was well after dark (and even after bedtime the second night) by the time we went to dinner.

Adult Bald Eagle a little closer

If you have never been to the Atlanta Marriott Marquis, it’s worth seeing. In fact, I need to plan a weekend in Atlanta that includes shooting the lobby. I shot the Marquis lobby many years ago with my old PowerShot G3 and no tripod. I would love to see what I could get with my current camera on a tripod. If you want to see what it looks like, here’s the post with the old photos.

The thing about going to work events is that it sounds like fun, and some of it is fun, but it’s really tiring. Pat and Tisen delivered me to Atlanta on Monday night. We stayed in a La Quinta hotel a few miles North of the Marquis. This is because La Quinta allows dogs. They don’t even charge extra.

Three cranes circling the refuge

However, La Quinta is not in the best of locations and they don’t have the most comfortable of beds. So, I started my 3 days already tired and slept less and worse the next two nights alone in a hotel around the corner from the Marquis. Between limited sleep, walking around all day, eating crap, and being on my best behavior from 7AM to 11PM for 3 days, I’m pretty darn beat.

I think it’s probably the being on my best behavior part that’s so darn tiring–it’s be so much easier to just be myself.

Clearing the tree

The saving grace was that I was only a 2-hour drive away and in the same time zone. Given that many of my colleagues were there from Europe and a few from Asia, I didn’t really feel like I could complain. I’m feeling ready to go to bed (and to perhaps stay there through the weekend) none-the-less.

Looking across the lake

Tisen’s Turn

Posted by dkrashb on November 24, 2012

I imagine our day from Tisen’s perspective. If Tisen were writing this post, what would he say?

“Mom put antlers on my head. I’m felt stupid, but Mom kept smiling, so I pretended I liked it. As long as I had my fluffy bed and Jack, I really didn’t care about the antlers.

Mom also put a snug sweater on me. It was warm and felt like a hug. Daddy rolls his eyes when Mommy puts it on me, but I kind of like it.

They left me in the sunroom with my breakfast and a rabbit. I gobbled down my breakfast before the rabbit could get out and steal it, but then I was in the sunroom all by myself with that rabbit. It kept watching me.

Eventually, they came back and took me outside. I got to sniff and pee on some of my favorite spots, and then, JOY! They finally let me back in the van. I love the van. It takes me places with Mommy and Daddy.

We didn’t go very far before we stopped though. Mommy and Daddy met up with Uncle Paul and Aunt Megan. I watched them walk into a building. It was so windy, Mommy’s hair flipped up like a toupee in the wind.

They were in there a long time. I got worried. I decided I’d better take shotgun position so I could keep a closer eye on the door. It was getting cold in the car while I was sitting there. Mommy left me a blanket on my fluffy bed, but I was determined not to take my eyes off the door, so I stayed put.

Eventually they returned. Mommy got in the seat with me and let me sit on her lap while Daddy drove around for a little bit. Mommy was so warm. She pulled the blanket over my cold ears and paws and cuddled me while Daddy went somewhere. When Daddy came back, I had to get in the back on my bed. I didn’t want to leave Mommy, but she insisted.

Mommy covered me with my blanket and then we drove for a really long time.

I was getting too warm. I had to get out from under my blanket. Then, we stopped and Daddy took off my jacket and walked me around in some nice grass.

After that, I got to sleep in the back for a long time. Mommy was sleeping in her seat, too. I was a little worried about her because her head kept tipping over, but every time I checked on her, she was OK.

After a long time, we were in my very own parking lot and Mommy took me for a walk around my very own park. Then, we went inside and I found Tiger, Blue Dog, Skunk, and Big Dog all waiting for me. I told them all about my adventure, but I’m not sure they believed me. Especially the part about the rabbit.

Visual Effects

Posted by dkrashb on October 23, 2012

At times like these, I wish I had the kind of job that could be blogged about. I say this only because I have been spending way too many hours working the past few weeks and, as a result, am running out of more universally interesting things to write about.

Normally, I would have done enough shooting over the weekend to have brand new photos for you and stories to tell about them for the next five days. Unfortunately, between my photography-free road trip on Saturday and working all day Sunday, I am out of new photos.

Even more frighteningly, I am nearly out of old photos I haven’t previously shared as well.

So, for today’s blog, I thought I would experiment with some old photos from our second trip to Mt. St. Helen.

It’s pretty amazing what can be done with a photo in even relatively simple photo editing software like Aperture, my personal favorite. In today’s gallery, I’ve posted a series of photos that are quite similar. I processed 3 exposures using the Photomatix HDR plug-in for Aperture and created two unique exports from Photomatix. In the one, I used more natural-looking settings. In the other, I used an “artistic” lighting effect that made the foreground and sky look lit differently.

Then, I used my standard post-processing adjustments on them in Aperture. Mainly, I played with highlights and shadows and the levels. Once this was done, I made a duplicate of each version and then tried something new.

The first image used a built-in effect for black and white with a red filter. I also pulled the black point up–many greens disappeared into the shadows. I experimented with different combinations of lifting the shadows and then raising the black point and finally settled on this one. It’s dark and gloomy. I hope it shows up OK for folks–sometimes photos look brighter to me on my iMac than they do after posting to my blog.

The other crazy thing I did was with the second duplicate. I played with tint and saturation and took the photo to the point where I thought my eyes would bleed if I looked at it any longer. Then, I backed it off to the brink of pain.

I have no explanation for why I did this. It just looks too purple when I look at it now. Perhaps I thought it was time to start exploring the possibilities instead of remaining stuck in reality.

Wouldn’t it be nice if it only took a slider control to add saturation, luminance, and vibrancy to real life?

Fall Color

Posted by dkrashb on October 21, 2012

Wanderlust is a chronic illness for which there is no known cure. Treatments range from acceptance and indulgence to denial and deprivation. Every once in a while, a little indulgence really pays. Especially in the fall.

If there is one thing I miss about the midwest, it’s the intense colors of the fall leaves. But, a road trip through Northern Tennessee and Kentucky provided a fantastic surprise. The leaves are amazing here in the South this year. There was one major drawback, however: I didn’t get to take any pictures.

The images in the gallery were taken several years ago in Columbus, Ohio. One of the big problems about wanting to take photos of leaves in Columbus is that it’s really flat. It makes it difficult to find a perspective that really shows off the leaves. It hadn’t occurred to before why everyone goes to Vermont for fall color viewing. Not only does it have more hardwood trees that provide the intense colors we see in the midwest only multiplied, but it also provides lovely mountains completely covered in these brilliant leaves. Until I drove through the Southern version of Vermont today, it had never occurred to me what a difference mountains make, and, specifically, mountains in the East, in how spectacular the color looks. You don’t get that in the Rockies.

I really wanted to pull off the highway, get out my camera and start shooting. I was worried about two things however. First, I was really tired and I wanted to make it back home before I started falling asleep at the wheel. Second, I’m pretty sure the shoulder of a freeway is for emergencies only. Would the highway patrol accept perfect lighting hitting brilliantly colored leaves as an emergency condition? If there would have been an exit with an obvious route to the same view I had from the freeway, I definitely would have pulled over when beams of sunlight burst through dark clouds and highlighted some of the trees on the hillside. Or, when the sun was setting and the light was hitting the tops of the mountains while thick cloud cover above provided the perfect contrast from above.

I started plotting whether I could find time to take another drive on Sunday. But, the sun went down and left me guessing as to how colorful the leaves were as I got closer to home. I was still two hours away when the light faded.

Tisen curled up on the passenger seat and took no notice of the leaves. Maybe it’s true that dogs only see in black and white.

Powell’s Books

Posted by dkrashb on October 18, 2012

Every town has a store that everyone who visits must go to. It’s a rule. If you’re going to build a town and people are going to come visit it, there must be at least one retail establishment that everyone wants to go to while they’re there. I don’t know what this place is for a lot of towns I’ve been to, but I know it’s there. In Portland, Powell Books is the must-see tourist store (although it seems to have a lyal local following too, which has to help financially).

I used to think the OSU library was enormous. Towers and towers of books. I don’t know if a city block of book is larger or not, but it sure feels bigger. When you walk into Powell’s, you have to reference a map with a color-coded key that tells you where different types of books are. I guess you don’t have to reference it, really. But, having spent a considerable amount of time wandering around looking for something, I strongly advise it.

Once you figure out which wing of the building the book you’re looking for resides in, you still must navigate the building that corresponds to that selection to find it. It’s one of those bookstores that makes you understand why bookstores have librarians on had to find books you’re looking for and direct you to it.

There was a time when I could spend an entire day wandering around a book store. These days, only the Apple store could keep me occupied that long. Instead of lingering among books that smell like they’ve been lingering far longer, I have gravitated to the electronic version of books. Given that I carry an iPad and iPhone with me virtually everywhere I go, it seems like a better use of the products I already own to double up the value of my investment.

Besides, who wants to haul more than 1 big dusty volume from the 18th century or earlier?

We are at Powell’s Books with our friends from Seattle today. They have never been inside before, so we suddenly feel like tour guides. We step inside and consult the map. We point to different sections of the store. My friend wants one particular book. she asks for assistance to find it. It’s located right next to where we’re standing. We go get in line, check out, and leave. We walked out without remembering to take them through the entire building. Some tour guides!

Shooting Elk

Posted by dkrashb on October 17, 2012

I really enjoy wildlife. The more wild, the better (well, until I start to look like dinner). I get a bigger thrill out of seeing a deer in the park than I do at the zoo. I get an even bigger thrill seeing a deer in the backwoods than I do at a park. The more remote an area, the bigger the thrill.

Elk are more exciting than deer proportional to their weight. I think there’s probably an algorithm out there that someone has developed to calculate the level of excitement any given creature produces based on their size, elusiveness, rarity, and number of people they encounter in an average year.

Seeing an elk is more exciting both because it’s bigger and because it’s more rare. At least for someone who’s lived East of the Mississippi for most of her life it’s more rare. Where elk can be found in the East, they have been recently reintroduced. They wear large tags around their necks that I suspect say things like “My name is Leroy.”

I don’t know why they look less wild than their relatives in the West, but they do. Even though it’s more likely that you’ll run into an Elk while cruising down a highway in the Canadian Rockies than in Great Smokey National Park, when you see the Elk in Great Smokey National Park, you’ll swear it’s one of the ranger’s pets. The “more rare = more wild” equation just doesn’t hold true in the East.

What all this adds up to is an inappropriate level of excitement about seeing a bunch of elk who live about an hour from Portland. I thought we would have the best chance of seeing the Elk at dusk, so we stopped on our way back from Astoria at the Jewell Meadows Wildlife Preserve. Granted, the website told us that the best time to see the elk was between November and April, but since we weren’t planning to be in Oregon between November and April, we figured we’d better take our chances. Besides, it was pretty much on the way back to my dad’s.

We did not get to see the full herd of 200 elk, but we did get to see a couple dozen elk from a distance. I thought they would be roaming around grazing a bit more than they were–I guess they go to bed earlier on the coast.

For about the thousandth time during our trip I wished I had a lens longer than 400mm. I shot the elk anyway, hoping the resolution of my camera would be enough to allow me to crop the heck out of the photos. Unfortunately, the photos didn’t withstand the crop. Between the motion of me hand-holding the camera and the motion of the elk, the images are just not sharp enough.

Regardless, I’m still glad we stopped to shoot the elk. I’m also glad I was shooting with a camera. 🙂

nomadicmainstream

Combining living on the road with a mainstream lifestyle

Category Archives: Road Trip