DPC: Grey

dismal winter skies

One of my few entries not to get any comments during the voting week.

DPC: A Single Tree 2

Alone at the End

I found this stump during our second trip to the Arboretum. Finding a "single" tree there, other than something like this, just wasn't going to happen.

Morton Arboretum (Revisited)

We had so much fun hiking around last weekend we went back for more. It was colder this time, but that didn't deter us from hiking around in the snow.

Morton Arboretum

DPC: Bokeh 5

Typo

Sonya gave me the title for this shot (my first take was "one letter off"). The color is a little flat; the ambient light was filtered through heavy clouds, and I was trying to get the snow exposed correctly.

Gnome Trains!

Well, not really Gnome trains, but both trains and gnomes were on display at the Morton Arboretum. We took Jason primarily to see their train setup, but we had more fun trying to find all of the hidden gnomes around the park. Our recent warm weather melted most of the snow, making this kind of scavenger hunt more enjoyable.

DPC: Free Study (March)

Missing California

Jason was the only kid in the playground this early day in March. It had started to snow heavy flakes, so called "heart attack" snow to the people who shovel it.

Field Museum

Didn't I just post about rites of Spring? Yesterday about six inches of snow dumped on Chicago! I had the day off, and had plans to take Jason to the Field Museum. Yesterday's weather gave too many other people the same idea, and it was crowded like a weekend afternoon.


Even though we had just been to the museum recently, we were still able to spend hours there and not see anything that we saw on our last visit. The Field Museum is just that big and that impressive!

Lately

I took the family up to Iowa recently, and totally forgot to blog about it. Apparently I'm too far removed from the days of working for a search engine company or an email startup. I'm sometimes surprised I manage to get more than a couple posts on this blog each week.

You've probably noticed the "Worth Reading" sidebar. You should be reading those articles. I only share the good stuff because I like you.

This week's challenge for DPC was Blurry Mess, and it was a lot of fun to shoot for it. You can expect to see my entry for that after voting ends next Tuesday.

DPC: Free Study, January 2008

Forgotten Benches

DPC: Architecture 4

Tale of Two Bridges

Diversey Hill

All that cold weather and snow we had the last couple of days, coupled with a nice day today, made for some excellent sledding conditions on The Hill. Sonya was even able to join us this time! We have a two of those disc sleds, and the three of us had a blast.

Tomorrow of course is the Superbowl. We don't have any plans to watch the game with other people (yet), and Sonya has to work at the hospital all day. Jason and I will play in the snow at home during the day most likely, and watch the game here.

I think the Patriots should sell "Official Team Camcorders" on their website..

Dropped 50!

The "Ugly Fountain" at Embarcadero in San Francisco.

It dropped about 50 degrees yesterday afternoon, from around 46 to -4, and the wind chill made it worse. While I was visiting the Bay Area last week, my aunt apologized for it raining every day (as if she controlled the weather). At the time, I thought rain was great, it meant it was warm enough to rain! I'd look up Chicago weather, and see numbers like "1" or "5", and think about how happy I was to not be in the middle of it. Winter decided to start without me, but there was plenty left for me to enjoy when I got back home.

During my vacation, I got in some quality Wii game time with my friend George. Resident Evil was fantastic as a two player game, and the Lynx Crossbow game that comes with the Wii Zapper was fun to power through. Mario Galaxy didn't excite me, but then the only Mario title that did was MarioKart64. We tried out Geometry Wars and Alien Syndrome; those played alright for filler games, but when we were done taking a break it was back to Resident Evil.

I'm finally able to get my car repaired from when I got rear-ended in November. Unfortunately, I have to drive this rental in the meantime that doesn't even measure up to the lofty standards of the 1979 Toyota Corolla I drove in high school. I didn't know modern cars were built without power locks! It handles exceptionally poorly on snow dusted roads, and doesn't even get decent gas milage.

In other news, I will be at FAnime this year.

Happy Birthday Dhane!

Saturday we trekked out to Rockford for my nephew Dhane's second birthday at an indoor water park. The lines were short, the slides fast, and who would have thought I'd be on a waterslide in Illinois in January? Jason had fun in the wading area, and braved a couple of the kid-sized slides.

Kedzie Bridge (again)

I joined a local Meetup photography group to get pictures of the Kedzie Street bridge at twilight. I knew it'd be cold, but I was hoping for some snow falling to add to the picture. It felt like it was about 10 degrees out, and after an hour of waiting for the light to become ideal, I decided I was done for the night.

Afterward it rained, ruining any plans I had to go sledding with Jason the following morning.

Almost winter

After a fairly warm Fall we're starting to consistently get days around or below freezing, but even if we get a whole month of days around 0F, it'll be easier than last winter. Why, you ask? The answer is simple: diapers, or the lack thereof. Yes, no more "this has to go out right now" trips through arctic conditions to get a stinky diaper out to the garbage cans.