Old Passions, New Passions

Those that know me best know that one of the things I love doing is to go canoeing on the large local river. I have the process of putting the canoe on the car and taking it off down to a science. I can have the car completely unloaded in five minutes or less. It is a short ten minute drive; the eastern river shoreline is six miles from here. The Susquehanna River is at one of it's widest points before it empties into the Chesapeake Bay some twenty-some miles south of here.

Those that know me best also know that I love taking pictures, too. I love my camera and take it with me almost everywhere I go. My plethora of images is one of the things that inspired this blog. Why not share?

I mentioned in an earlier post that I am loving my new computer, too. I spent some time playing with the software to manipulate some of my images into 'iMovies.' Last night I posted my first video to YouTube.

The link to my first online video is -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKJ6Yz3FndA

I thought it fitting that my first video posting should be something related to my love of my canoe and the river; especially my river island beach. The video is titled, 'A day on my river.' I hoped somehow to capture some sense of how truly beautiful it is out there. It's just over a minute long. I strung some photos together and pasted some audio effects to produce it. Should you take the time to view it; I hope you enjoy it. I had a lot of fun putting it together.

Making movies might become something of a new passion.

I'll let you all know when there's any more.

I hope everyone's holiday dreams came true.

May the peace of the season be with you all.

Merry Christmas

May the Spirit of the Season be with everyone.

May all your holiday dreams come true.

A Bizillion Balls then Under the Bridge

While in Manhattan we ventured over to the East Side the one afternoon for lunch. Steve and Nancy had read or been told about a place that was known for their Christmas decorations which were over-the-top. It was someplace new and they knew Jeff would love it. They had made reservations a day-or-so earlier. We arrived right on time; the staff had misplaced the reservation. Luckily, it wasn't a problem and we were seated promptly. They might not have had the reservation but they certainly were decorated to the hilt. As you can see in the bottom four photos; there are a bizillion balls, a bizillion lights and other stuff, too.

I had to ask our server how long it took to put out the display. He told us they waited until they closed at 10PM and set about decorating for hours each night for three weeks. The name of the place is Rolf's. It is located at 3rd and 22nd; I think. It is a German pub. Real German beer and various wursts and brats, too. It was fun and, no doubt, something to see.

That evening Jeff and I went and met other friends in Manhattan, Tom and Janelle, at a small pub down in Lower Manhattan. We read about it in the Zagat guide and it sounded very interesting. It was called the Bridge Cafe and is located on Water Street. The building dates from 1792. The streets are very old and narrow down there. The Brooklyn Bridge crosses into Manhattan just across the street. The pub lies almost beneath it. From the window by my seat I could look up and see the lighted suspension cables above the walkway and traffic lanes going off towards Brooklyn to the right. It was very cool. Tom and Janelle have lived in Manhattan for many years. They had never been there, either. They told us they thought they would try someplace new.

It was very cool. True to what was said in the guide; it was close to the South Street tourist area but there were no visible tourists inside. It was like any small town tavern. You would never guess you were in Manhattan; never guess you were almost under the bridge, either. The atmosphere is casual; the menu fare classic Americana. One item, however, jumped out at both Jeff and I. It was called 'Lobster Pie.' We both had to get it.

The Lobster Pie was just as the name implies; a light puffy pastry pie stuffed with big chunks of lobster in a white sauce with peas, diced potatoes. It was awesome. Janelle was seated across the table from me. I couldn't help but think from her comments as Jeff and I enjoyed them immensely; that maybe they will go back sometime so she can order one, too.

The top photo above was taken of the side of Bridge Cafe from across Water Street as we walked up towards City Hall to catch an uptown bus. As I mentioned, Tom and Janelle have lived in Manhattan for many years. She knows the mass transit system very well. She knows the city very well. This particular bus took us through Alphabet City and the Lower East Side. We passed through Chinatown and past Bellevue Hospital, too. It was fun to have Janelle point out anything of interest along the way. Jeff and I hadn't seen them for quite some time. It was very good to see them. It was a lot of fun.

Hope all's well with everyone.

Stay warm, have fun and take care.

Lovin' the Mac-mini!

I mentioned in an earlier post my purchase a few days ago at the local Apple store of a Mac-mini. I have been on a four day learning curve to reacquaint myself with the superior interface of the Mac operating system as compared to any version I've worked with of Microsoft's Windows. I have been loving it.

Today I wanted to organize photos stored on a USB flash drive. It was great to view the thumbnails, highlight and drag them into the files where I wanted them to be placed on the new little box. The whole thing is two inches by six inches by six inches. It's pretty amazing. Austin, the Apple associate who facilitated the sale, advised me that any of my USB peripherals I had used with the dead PC would work with my new system. He was correct.

I did discover I'm going to have to 're-construct' my iPod; which I understand.

It would have been nice to be able to import all those files as easily as the photos. I'm sure when I 'clean the iPod up;' it will be easy, too. That was the only thing that was not 'seamless' with the transition from system-to-system. Ironic that it's with another Apple product. I'm not a peer-to-peer 'pirate,' ya know? All my iPod tunes were loaded from discs or purchased from the iTunes store online and loaded onto the now dead PC's iTunes. I have to erase, re-synch and reload everything onto the iPod. They must have the technology to know it's me and that I haven't stolen any tunes. That is my only criticism.

Interesting for me, too, that now that I have a fast PC my broadband internet seems slow.

It is still cold outside in this part of the world.

I hope where ever you are that things are nice and warm.

Take care and have fun.

Very Near Catastrophe

I mentioned in the post 'Back to the Future' that my PC died last week. I am now a very happy mini-Mac owner. I am liking it very much. My original plan for the week was to catch up on things around the houses...mine and my mom's...on Monday after work, as I had been away for the weekend; then go shop for a new computer Tuesday evening. Those plans changed.

I had gone to the store Monday evening after work to get and take groceries over to my mom. After I left the grocery store I hit a traffic snag. Fire police were redirecting the traffic on the road to mom's house. Such situations create a traffic nightmare here. I decided I would just go back home and run the stuff over in the morning.

I got up early Tuesday morning, showered and walked the dog. I came down in the basement and smoked a cigarette before I headed out to face the new day. I got the dog some fresh water and made sure he had food in his bowl. I realized I had to 'get a move on' to get everything I had to do done before I went to work. Just before I headed upstairs I planted my cigarette into an 'overcrowded' glass ashtray. It needed to be emptied. I said good-bye to the dog and left the house for the day.

I went about my day and thought about whether or not I could afford the new computer that I really wanted. I have a nineteen mile/half hour commute in each direction. I am away from the house while working for nine-and-a-half hours. When I got home Tuesday evening I came home to a big surprise.

I opened the door to a heavy odor of smoke. Not cigarette smoke; it was a 'something's burning smoke.' I immediately went downstairs to investigate. What I found was stunning.

The smell of smoke was thick in the air of the basement as I descended the stairs. I looked immediately towards the ashtray that was sitting atop a printer adjacent to my chair here at the PC. The ashtray was shattered. My checkbook had two inches of charred paper; it had burned through all twenty five checks with the attached carbon copies. Jeff happened to call as I was surveying my initial discovery. I told him I was stunned. Our conversation was brief as he was home from work and his beautiful baby Pug Sophie was demanding his attention. After I talked to him I made an even more stunning discovery.

As I was talking on the phone I noticed that the lights were off on my DSL modem. I checked to be sure it was plugged in. I looked down towards the power strip to find that the power strip was burned, too. A four inch length of the plastic casing was melted and charred. There was an extension cord plugged into the power strip. The fire had burned through the insulation exposing bare wires. It was definitely one of those 'OMG' and 'WTF' moments all rolled into one.

It was clear the cigarette I stuffed in the ashtray this morning created a smoldering fire with all the butts it contained. The heat became so hot that the ashtray had shattered. When it did, the checkbook burned and some of the burning debris fell on the floor to melt/char the power strip and burn the insulation off the extension cord. When the gravity of the potential consequences sunk in, I immediately 'loved' the dog. His bed is but three feet from the power strip. He often throws a pillow around when I am not here. Had that landed on the burning extension cord, who knows? My God! The poor little guy might have been scared to death. I wondered later if he might have put it out somehow as he is really smart.

I immediately changed my plans, too. No shopping tonight. My God, how lucky could I be. Clearly, my house could have burned down; little Henry might be gone, too. Unbelievable!

I got in the car and drove to a local 'distributor.' I bought beer and lottery tickets. I am familiar with both of the people working there that night and I told them the story which explained why I was buying the lottery tickets. They agreed; I dodged a bullet. On one score I had to celebrate; on another I had to take a chance as I felt very lucky. Those that know me may chuckle at that. I was very lucky, indeed.

I talked to a local friend of mine Wednesday afternoon. As I told her what happened I got paranoid. I feared I hadn't found all the electrical damage. I feared I might have missed something. I was relieved when I rounded the corner on my drive home and the house was still there. The whole experience did 'spook' me and yes, Steve, it might be one more reason to quit smoking.

Just my drama of the week.

For now I want to stick to fires like the one featured at the top of yesterday's post below. No doubt, much safer when you are not home.

It's very cold here in the Northeast. No doubt, an early winter blast.

Hope everyone is staying warm and having fun.

Staying safe, too!

Christmas-time in Manhattan

I am very fortunate to live within little more than a two hour drive from Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, NYC, the beach and the mountains. I like the change of seasons, too. I suppose those two facts have contributed to my tolerance of the cultural shortcomings of this area. I am also very fortunate to have very good friends that have allowed me to get to be comfortable and familiar with Manhattan. It is always fun to go there and experience it. Things are much more alive there than here in Amishland.

I have traveled into the city during all four seasons. Perhaps the nicest time to be there is this time. The city comes even more alive in its expression of the Christmas spirit. Friend Steve may have said it best when he said, 'Ya know, New York is a city of neighborhoods like any other. It's just bigger...and so is everything else.' So it is. At this time of year it is almost magical.

The pictures shown below in 'New Scenes from a Life' were taken this past weekend in Manhattan. The photo above is a warm Manhattan fireplace.

Hope all's well with everyone.

Enjoy the spirit of the season.

Back to the Future

This past weekend I found myself in Manhattan for a quick weekend trip. My friend, Jeff, flew in from Michigan and we met at our friends Steve-and- Nancy's apartment on W. 46th St. in Manhattan. As always, we had a good time. It's almost a tradition as I think for the past few years we have all been in Manhattan that first weekend in December; and have been together.

At some point in conversation over the weekend, I mentioned that my PC had died. I had the laptop; the tower was dead. Steve and Nancy had purchased an Apple laptop some months earlier and they loved it. I told them the first home computer I ever had was a MacIntosh...soon after they came out in the mid-80's. I loved it then but when Microsoft came to dominate the market and it was time for me to upgrade I jumped to a Windows-based PC. At the time, the Windows operating system seemed like a cheap imitation of the MacIntosh interface.

Steve's job is in technology and internet applications for a large corporation. He heard me describe my need for a new PC as old age and a virus had killed mine. He advised me to think about a Mac. He has some sense of what I do with my PC and online. We were all sitting around in their living room with our laptops connected to their home wifi. I got on Apple's website and he discussed the specs with me and advised me to consider it.

I got home from work tonight, put the dog out, then packed him up and the two of us drove to the big local mall. There is an Apple store there. I walked in and was greeted warmly. I told the woman the specific product I was interested in and she introduced me to Austin. Twenty minutes-or-so later I was walking back to the car hoping Henry hadn't hit the button for the emergency flashers. In my hands I had my brand new mini-Mac with sleek keyboard and cool magic mouse. I plugged it all together in minutes and here I am!

This is my first post using it. So far, so good. I am very happy with it.

Many thanks to Steve for his good counsel.

Many thanks to all three of them for everything else.

It's always great to be together.

I hope all's well with everyone.

Have fun.

Take Care.

The pictures posted in the entry below below were taken this past weekend in Manhattan.

New Scenes of a Life

Scenes from a Life

Just some random pictures that seemed uploadable.

The pictures above were taken from the rooftop of my friends' beautiful new apartment building in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan; just west of Times Square. The visible white glow in the distant foreground of the photo is the glow from all the neon and lights in Times Square.

On Monday I was on a route that had me running 'troubles' all day. They were mostly internet service problems. I showed up at one job and the guy led me down into his darkened basement where the computer, the router and all his equipment was located. I could see his wide screen monitor from across the room and was intrigued by the photo he had displayed on his computer desktop. I walked over and sat down as he described the trouble he was having. He was one of the few people I encounter in such situations that knew what he was talking about and had done and tried all the right things.

As I sat down and connected my equipment to the cable line I looked more closely at the picture on his PC. It was a night time shot; somewhat distorted. It was clearly NYC as the Empire State Building was partially visible to the right of the photo. As my meter was processing things, a process that takes a couple minutes, I studied his display more closely. I realized that his picture had to have been taken on the same street in Manhattan where my friends live; just an avenue east towards Times Square.

I mentioned to the guy that I was interested in the photo soon after I sat down. The scene looked 'vaguely' familiar to me. I have 4x6 prints of the pictures above paper-clipped with a bunch of others inside my metallic work clip-board. As I waited for my equipment to process the signal readings, I pulled those two photos from my clip-board and I showed him what I meant. I pointed to the distorted buildings in his picture and the real ones in mine. He could see that I was right, he laughed and said, 'That's pretty cool.' He had never been to the city; he just liked the picture he chose to display on his desktop.

I have been on that rooftop many times and, day or night, it is always somewhat 'magical.' For me, seeing his desktop reminded me how truly lucky I am.

Great friends, great times in a great city.
Life gets no better than that.

I look forward to seeing them all there very soon.

I hope all's well with everyone.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!