Dearth of Blog Posts--

SUMMARY: --but--but--so much to say to myself, to keep notes on, to share photos of, not to mention the photo themes from assorted places on the web!

So pretty much I don't post anything.

As a stopgap, here are a few quickie shots from this week from my corner of San Jose, CA.

Last Saturday--Who puts candy stores like this in my nearby mall? WHO WHO WHO? WHY? It goes on and on like this, and worse! Lucky to have gotten out for under $20 and under 20,000 calories! Yikes!

Later Saturday--Zorro and Chip play The Stupid Tunnel Game. Plus, considering that I haven't had an actual functioning agility dog in a year and a half, I sure do have a lot still lying around instead of put away. (Including a pile of rotting tunnel sandbags & containers--)

Sunday-- Mom is ill. Modern technology comes to the rescue--camera-microphones in key places in the house and a wireless monitor, so when I'm over there on a Sunday morning and having Diet Cherry Coke^tm and brownies for breakfast, I'll know if she's trying to sneak up on me and tell me that that is NOT an appropriate breakfast, Young Lady! Plus, meanwhile, my screensaver shows a photo of all of us "kids" wearing tshirts that she gave us one Christmas many years ago.

Monday-- 106.9 F (41.6 C) in my yard around 3:00.  That's also about when what is now known as The Loma Fire breaks out on Loma Prieta peak. By 5:30, the mushroom cloud has spread eastward across the south valley. Although that's about 12 miles from my house, I can see this clearly and also the flames at night. (As of last night, it had over 2,000 fire personnel working to contain it, had consumed almost 7 square miles (18 sq. km), and was anticipated to be contained by sometime this coming Monday. Contained, not out. I can smell the smoke. I can cough on the smoke.

Tuesday-- The story here, among those who have a prime view, is still the Loma Fire. I refuse to use a tripod, but still can clearly see flames and their glow in the thick, drought-fed smoke in the distance.

Wednesday--Don't let Chip pull the wool over your eyes, all innocent and pushing his Kong Wobbler food dispenser around like a neat and tidy dog--half an hour before the carpet wore a mantle of crumbled dirt clods and chewed-up sticks, and it will again half an hour from now. And WHO with dogs would have carpet that color ANYWAY?!

Thursday--I love my kitchen clock. Still makes me smile, 15 years after I found it at an art & wine show. Can you see how the second hand is like a little red corkscrew? Happy happy happy time!

Yesterday (Friday)-- Us iz bored, Human Mom? Nooooo! No pay usses no mind, H.M., go on work your computer on, on couch, iz OK.

Today--2nd annual Martial Cottle Park Harvest Festival. Walking distance behind my house. How cool is that?!

And WHO KNOWS what tomorrow will bring?! Maybe a movie? Some popcorn? Dog antics? Maybe even dog TRAINING? Sleeping? Good thing I have a camera to record it all!

Street--er, Park--Photography

SUMMARY: Festival at Hellyer Park.

Today I went out to an event at Hellyer Park put on by Santa Clara County Parks and Rec, "Festival in the Park." Lots and lots of booths and entertainment with a strong focus on health--the way you eat, the way you exercise, the way you live your life... it was pretty cool.

They had free kayaking, free bounce houses for the kids, free ice cream (well...ok, ya gotta do something with sugar in it to attract the crowds).

Plus they had a snowy egret passing through.

I went primarily to participate in a "flash mob"--we knew the four basic dance steps ahead of time, and at 12:15 when the Lady Gaga music started playing, we were all supposed to stop what we were doing, do the dance, then go back to what we were doing. I happened to be up at the front of the fair when 12:15 hit, so I didn't see what might have been going on behind me at all the booths and in all the aisles, but the people on stage seemed to think that there were a lot of participants. It was a good workout, anyway.

My secondary goal was to practice event, people, and "street" photography. The latter is apparently a specialized category that I just learned about this month. Read about it on Wikipedia. Basically it's candid photography, but you're looking for those really special moments, those really interesting, amusing, unusual, creative, one-of-a-kind moments. There are whole cadres of people devoted to certain types of cameras that are best for that, certain styles of getting the shots... in short, a whole 'nother way of photographic life, when all I thought I was doing was shooting candid photos.

I found this site with some amazing examples of the best of street photography--you might be entertained to browse some of those photos.

So, energized by a whole new perspective on taking random & candid photos, I went out there to try my luck.

Got captivated mostly by cute kids and dogs, though.

In retrospect, maybe I could've, say, hung out by the big sign that had the word "obesity" on it and waited for, er, robust people to pass by and take their photos, or other clever things like that, but it was fun to just walk around and look for nice shots.

See all the rest from today here on my photo site.

(Well, not ALL the rest--I took about 160 shots, posted about 80 of 'em.)