Deja vu

Okay, I missed posting on Saturday, but I have a very, very good reason. I was working most of the day to finish the videos for Tom and Virginia's wedding reception, and I didn't get home till 3 am.

As some of you know, we held a roast for Tom's 40th birthday in 2003 at the McBeth Recreation Center in Zilker Park. That went so well, Tom and Virginia chose the same location for this party. In 2003, this is how I spent much of the party:

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And here I am on Saturday, 4 1/2 years later:

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Note that while those laptops look similar, that's actually the successor to my iBook, my new MacBook, in the second photo. And I only had to run the multimedia show for about 20 minutes this time instead of during the whole shebang. And here's one of the videos I showed that night, the trailer for Tom and Virginia's wedding:

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Week of Blogging update

Okay, this is a bit of a cheat, but hell, I've been working hard on editing videos for Tom and Virginia's wedding reception/party tomorrow, so back off! So today I'll just toss out some kudos for Jessie's Girl, CMC, Matt, and most of all, Barbara for participating in my "call to arms" in this Week of Blogging! JG and CMC were still posting fairly regularly this summer, yet they still were willing to participate and post more often. But Babs broke a dry spell stretching way back to May ... and has actually posted 3 times this week! Andrew has posted as well, though I'm sure this had nothing to do with that because he had also been good about posting while my blog entered the desert. That leaves ... Tamara...? She's promised to post this week, soooo... we're waiting...! (Tom gets a pass because he has to get ready for the big party tomorrow).

Work update

I haven't discussed my current job much, and I've been there nearly 5 months now. I'm still a contractor; no ETA on if/when I could go permanent. But as long as I have a steady paycheck and health insurance, going permanent is less of a pressing concern than it was at my last job a year ago. I've already proven to myself that my world won't crumble if I take a week of unpaid leave to go on vacation (see my previous entries about the Tahoe trip, plus I'm sure more entries to come), though I still feel somewhat limited in my vacation options, as I have to add the lost income into the cost of any trip. And it would be nice to have sick/personal time again.

The personalities at this place are much more open. Not that the last job was filled with unfriendly people, but I never really related to them. On the other hand, on my first day at this job, I sat in a conference room with my new manager -- whom I'd never met before because the manager I'd interviewed with had since left the company -- and for 20 minutes we talked about our digital photo and digital video experiences. That seemed like a very good start. And since then I've bonded a bit with some of my coworkers as I picked their brains about digital video cameras and showed off photos and such. And while I don't go to lunch with my coworkers regularly, I have gone a few times, something I never did over 6 months at my last job. (To be fair, I was invited to lunch a number of times at the last job, but I just didn't feel like I fit in and turned them all down).

Knowing more details about my future status at this company would be nice, and I still don't feel like I can make any really long-term plans, but I feel like most of my life is no longer on hold, and that's kinda nice...

Tahoe Wildlife, Part 3

I was tempted to go to bed early tonight when I realized uh oh, I haven't blogged yet. Damn! So here I am, living up to my self-imposed Week of Blogging.

So, Tahoe Wildlife, Part 3? Just how many more photos of birds and squirrels can I post?! Well, fear not, no more animals this time. Well, no feathered or four-legged or insectoid ones. This time, it's wild life, two words. Or party animals. Or at least, the best that passed for us being party animals on this trip.

We didn't drink anywhere near as much as we thought we would over the course of the week, but there was our second night in Tahoe, when we took a sunset champagne catamaran cruise on the lake. An all-you-can-drink champagne cruise. And I took that to heart most of all for some reason. After that, we went to the Cabo Wabo restaurant for dinner at one of the casinos, where Michelle K. and I each ordered what turned out to be massively strong drinks. Everyone was in a good mood, in various stages of buzzes (good sport Matt had volunteered to be the designated driver, but he seemed to have a good time nonetheless), but no one was more hammered than me or Michelle. You know the alcohol is flowing freely when 9 photos of people sitting around a table are snapped in just a couple of minutes.

Clearly, we're not in our 20s anymore, as this was the only time on the trip that we really partied hard. Oh well. The price of maturity, I guess. Nevertheless, here are the photos from that one standout night, which are pretty much self-explanatory:

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Tahoe Wildlife, Part 2

At long last, the continuation of my excerpts of Tahoe wildlife photos (see Part 1 here)! So, without further ado:

A closeup of a Steller's jay, perched and alert in a tree near our resort suite:

Alert Steller's jay
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Part 1 showed you the local chipmunks. Here's one of the local squirrels, which are brown with gray necks:

Tahoe squirrel
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Tahoe squirrel
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One afternoon, Barbara and I hiked up the mountain trail from our resort. This was the only time I saw this gray and white bird, and only from a distance. And it didn't stick around long enough for me to get my telephoto lens on, so this is the best shot I got:

Gray and white bird in a dead tree
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Also ran across this fat pudgy bird while on our hike:

Fat pudgy bird
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Back at our suite, while relaxing on the balcony, Lisa and I spotted this big ant crawling around in the sunlit areas. Upon closer inspection, we realized it was carrying a piece of bacon, dropped by someone during breakfast:

Bacon-loving ant
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Another Steller's jay (they were all over), this one in silhouette:

Silhouetted Steller's jay
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But here come the predators! Or at least the scavengers. These were probably vultures, though they look like birds of prey from a distance. So, not very exotic; I can see birds like this in Austin. As with most of the wildlife shots, this was seen from our suite's balcony. Of course, keep in mind this was taken with a telephoto:

Vulture hovers
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Trio of vultures
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And can I just say, my God was the sky so deep, deep blue at our resort! Way bluer than it was even by Lake Tahoe itself! That extra 1300 feet of elevation made a huge difference.

On our last full day in Tahoe, I went off hiking by myself up the mountain our suite was on. It was only then that I stumbled upon my most colorful wildlife finds of the entire trip. I don't know what these birds are, but they were having a feast of insects:

A male ... something
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A yellow-throated whatsit
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Colorful male something with insect
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Colorful male something with insect
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Colorful male something with insect
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Less colorful female something
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And finally, I leave this update with yet another shot of the bird I saw most, though this was the closest I got to one; this Steller's jay landed on our balcony in the wee hours of the morning shortly before we left for home:

Steller's jay
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Part 3 of Tahoe Wildlife coming, yes, tomorrow! Not next week or next month, tomorrow!

Rebirth addendum

After catching up on my blog reading, I feel I should point out in all fairness that some like Andrew and others (who would prefer me not to link to them) actually have been posting fairly regularly despite other conflicts ... I've just been behind in all blog aspects!

Blogging Rebirth

Okay, so "later this week" has become "sometime next month." What happened to not just my Tahoe picture series, but my blogging anything, period?? My main excuse is the Six Man, Texas website. I've spent most of my non-socializing free time over the past few weeks fleshing out the site with additional graphics, reorganizing sections, and adding new content. Check it out at http://sixmantexas.com!

That really has taken most of my free time; there have been too many evenings I never even got near my sofa, let alone stretched out and watched TV and relaxed. Usually I've been on the computer working in Photoshop while the TV was on.

However, I can't say I'm the only one slacking in my blogging circle. Some quit months ago, others slowed way down as summer bore down. I know some of you out there have some lame excuses like selling and buying homes simultaneously and then moving from one to the other, but still! So I challenge all of you to a Week of Blogging! Yes, I'm starting this on a Monday so I already missed Sunday and the goal is already impossible to attain, but damn the torpedoes, I'm gonna blog every day this week (from now on)!! And I challenge the rest of my blogging cronies to do the same! Or at least one post, for those of you who haven't posted since ... ahem ... MAY.

So stay tuned for new posts every day for the rest of this week, by hook or by crook, including the long-delayed continuation of the Tahoe Wildlife photos! Yes, THIS week! For real this time!