9 days/8 nights
4 flights, 3 hotels and 4 cities
3 cameras and 3600+ photos later

I had a great time in Spain with my family but it was definitely a trip not a vacation. I now need a vacation from my trip. If you don’t know what the difference is, think Spain vs St. Thomas.

I haven’t even really started to look through the pictures but here’s a little sampling of what’s to come.

1. At JFK
2. Sagrada Familia Church in Madrid
3. on a Bus Turistico in Madrid
4. Dinner @ La Creme Canala
5. @ Montserrat
6. @ Montserrat
7. On a Ryanair flight to Madrid
8. Renfe high speed AVE to Segovia
9. @ Madrid Airport

Mom and I decided to surprise Dad with a trip for his birthday. So after some research we decided to make it Spain since none of us had been yet. Open jaw into Barcelona for 3 days, puddle hopper flight to Granada to see the Alhambra for 1 day, and then off to Madrid for 3 days. With the itinerary set, the tickets for the 3 airplane legs purchased and the hotels reserved, my thoughts turned to the trip reveal. Since we were arriving in Barcelona on dad’s birthday, the reveal would have to be earlier than his birthday.

What to do? What to do?

Being a very visual person, I started collecting images of quintessential Spanish things. I started with the landmarks, the flag, a flamenco dancer and two Spanish artists Picasso and Goya. For Picasso, I chose the Guernica and for Goya I chose a portrait of his uncle. And while those my seem a bit esoteric for most people, since my parents own a framing store, these were images are very familiar to both of them.

I knew I wanted to do some sort of build for a reveal rather than a big bang. So at first I thought of mailing dad an image a day. But that was iffy. Monday’s would have to be sent Saturday? Would Tuesday’s get there if I sent it Monday? If dad guessed it on Tuesday, would it be early enough to stop Wednesday’s from going out? And most importantly, how much was postage nowadays?

That’s when I saw Mitsy’s post at Artmind on how to make scratch off lottery tickets. And an idea formed…a scratch off birthday card!

I decided to make a double sided 5×7 card with the images as scratch off guessing tiles.

I mixed the acrylic and dishsoap and made a test scratch off to see if it worked. Initially I used the red template as a frame thinking that it would make nice neat silver boxes. Well the acrylic liked the paper more than the plastic and peeled off with the template. Next time, I might score the boxes and then try to peel the paper. This time I decided to just paint the plastic and cut another red frame out and use it as a frame.

The final card came together so beautifully. I could barely contain myself through dinner before I handed the card over to dad.

And dad had a ton of fun guessing what it was. For the curious people, he scratched off the Picasso and Goya first and guessed Spain.

Jeff and Jayne’s nuptials got Connie and I back on the west coast for a trip to Yosemite. Already having put 930 miles on the car in one week, I was about to add another 700 before the trip was over but here are some of my favorite shots from the weekend.

So to make my west coast trip part vacation, I decided to take surfing lessons. Somewhere in my head, west coast=surfing. Little did I know when I started this idea that the water in the Pacific (59°F) doesn’t warm up like the Atlantic (71°F)

I went with Santa Cruz Surf School and went for 2 lessons. The first was a bad low tide only beach breaks lesson and the second was at 6AM out on Cowells Beach. Despite the fact, maybe in spite of the fact that I’m a swimmer, paddling was not so easy. First of all, it’s quite unnatural to swim with your legs and chest up so that your core is pressing against the board. Secondly and more importantly, swimmers don’t breathe when their arms are rotating. I made it out half way to the rendezvous point before my teacher asked if I was breathing with each stroke. And of course I wasn’t so I was already exhausted since I had just deprived my body of oxygen unnecessarily.

Once we started catching waves, I had a blast. Whether I was sticking the landing or not, I was having so much fun being out in the ocean. It wasn’t all that cold. I did both lessons without the booties cuz I liked feeling the board with my toes. Muscle memory is this odd thing. Think too much about what you’re doing and your timing is off. Don’t think at all and your form is all off. Practice a bunch and don’t think too hard, your muscles remember what to do…crazy!

As the sun was rising over the fog in Santa Cruz, I realized that I had to sell the snowboard. I realized that everything about snowboarding was based on fear for me. Linking turns better means going on blues and going faster. The boys I go with go on moguls and board in the Nintendo park for jumps. Now fear on it’s own is not a reason to stop but fear that does not get washed away by exhilaration when accomplishing the next hurdle is. Now that doesn’t mean I’m going to go out and swap the snowboard for surfboard but I am going to figure out how to incorporate more surfing into my life! So if anyone is in the market for a Cadence Arbor board, Flow boots and bindings let me know

I also spent the better part of Sunday taking some pictures of at Steamers Lane where some guys were practicing.

I got there on a cute little bike that Kieth at Electric Sierra Cycles let me take out on the house after I snapped some photos of all these great bikes lined up on Pacific Avenue. Thanks Keith!

Now, how do I incorporate more surfing into my life…

So after my bike ride, I thought I’d take some pictures of the bmx park. Since it was warm I went to throw my sweater in the trunk and promptly closed the trunk with the keys in my sweater. Thank goodness for the blackberry and google maps. I searched for car locksmith and called the 1st number that came up.

Me: "Are you a car locksmith?"
Tow: "No, but we can break into cars."
Me: "Great! Can you come break into my rental car?"

After the normal make, model, if I have a trunk latch in the car type questions, he quoted me price and sent this guy over.

So fascinating was the methodology, I couldn’t but help take pictures. He had what looked like a pastry scraper attached to a blood pressure cuff. He slid in the scraper side and then started pumping, the door became slightly ajar enough for him to start shimming in the pink rod.

The pink rod had a nub at the end so he could unlatch the door. Voila, I’m in my car, right? Well yes, sorta. The car alarm started going off and apparently the Elantra is a "smart" car - if I was the owner and not the renter! If the alarm goes off, it disables the trunk release!! So the nice gentleman moves to the back seat and starts tugging REALLY HARD on the seats. I am about the have a heart attack because I’ve realized

 1) The rental companies give you both set of keys on one hook (which I don’t get) which tells me that all keys are stuck in my trunk, and
 2) I saw a seat release latch on the inside of my trunk so since I can’t pull that none of the seats will pulldown.

Well, as luck would have it, he yanked hard enough for one of them to open up. He reaches in and retrieves my keys. YAY! HOORAY! WHEW! At this point I’m so elated, I gladly pay his highway robbery prices for a stick and a modified blood pressure cuff!

As an owner, I’d love to own a “smart” car but um as a renter…maybe they’re making these cars tooo smart!

It’s been a year since I stopped traveling to the west coast for work and now I have a great excuse to make it out there and roll a work trip into a mini vacation tied into a wedding at Yosemite.

My friend Dave and I like to do themed photo expeditions. Well it’s actually been singularly themed. You see, my photographic style tends to capture already beautiful things but Dave is exceptionally good at making urban grit look pretty. So in an attempt to make me see ordinary things as extraordinary, we go on photo expeditions. Last May, we toured a number of scavenger yards in South SF and apparently I didn’t post any of those pictures so here are my faves:

This time around, we walked around Chinatown trying to capture som urban grit. The day was pretty windy and by they end of the walk, neither of us were excited about the pics. But when I got home and looked at some of them more closely, I realized I really liked some of them.

Connie joined me for the second half of the week and we decided to go to the Santa Rosa county fair. I got to hold a chick(not that one) but missed the hatching of eggs by a day.

We saw enough livestock to last us a lifetime. Some of the dairy cows were humongous and there was a lot of hair spraying, spray painting and primping of these cows from some contest. Take a look at the difference in size between the two cows on the left and the cow on the right!

We also got to see Baby Ashley who crawled for us. She also was a very studious baby who would stare are you intently. She’s been going through some stranger anxiety, mostly with boys, but Kenny swears Ashely likes him, she just has to remember she does every time she seems him. Poor Kenny Oooh the chubbs — so cute!

So the long awaited Highline opened in NYC and while I have to admit it’s sad that there’s so much hype about an overly expensive park, it does fit NYC quite well. It utilized previously abandoned elevated railways, one can see water and flora, and just enjoy being outdoors. One of the more interesting things I learned is that the landscape was designed to be in bloom 10 months out of the year making it a compelling place to keep visiting over and over again and see new things.

Here’s what some of my faves from my first trip.

I’ve been back for sunsets and just to hangout but never with my camera. Need to remember that and go at dusk to get great night shots!

Fourth of July fireworks were all on the Hudson this year so thanks to Brian’s deck on the West Side Hwy, I got some of my favorite shots of the summer.

That last one is an ABSOLUTE favorite of mine. The 3 second exposure captured just enough wipsy fireworks at the right length to makes it look like a dandelion in a quick glance. I love making everyone look twice at this photo!

I also went shopping for glass in my dad’s “closet” and came out with a Vivitar 90mm Series 1 macro lens with a 2x converter. I’ve been having fun playing around with it.

As August is almost coming to a close, I look back at the summer and wonder where it all went and envy my nieces and nephews who have 3 months off! Here’s some of my favorite shots this summer.

Kick started the summer with a weekend jaunt to Mystic, CT to see the Seaport and the Aquarium. Breakfasts at Kitchen Little were the yummiest and dinner at the Captain Danial Packard Inne where the portabello appetizer - grilled over natural charcoal, topped with Alouette cheese and seasoned breadcrumbs then baked golden brown and served with an intensely flavored chive infused olive oil - was the yummiest!

From Mystic it was a hop, skip and jump to Battleship Cove in Fall River, MA. So I have to admit that one ship looks like another to me but I am in awe whenever I see the tight quarters and imagine what it would feel like at sea.

Alanna and I spent a Friday with other New Yorkers at Bubble Battle in Times Square. It was so fun to be a kid again but next time we have to get better automated bubble blowers. Ours failed…boo! =( I will definitely go again next year and I recommend it to everyone!

I also had the pleasure of holding a 6 day old Baby Niko. He was like JELLO. It’s pretty amazing how babies can instantly turn adults into moosh =) 4 adults stared at a sleeping baby for 3 hours!

This June was the 2nd wettest June on record and so summer really didn’t start till July.

An IM conversation today…
Me: sorry pidgin freaked out and crashed
Friend: as in a bird ran into your window?
Me: oh no hahahaha pidgin is another trillian
Friend: ah. cause i was having a good time imagining a pidgeon crashing into your window (as long as he flew away)

Apparently the correct pronunciation is N’awlins but everytime I say that here in NY I have to say New Orleans before anyone understands me. I was speaking at an Admonsters conference but took an extra day to be a tourist in NOLA since it was my first time.

A couple of gut reactions:

• Right off the bat, the Superdome is GIGANTIC! I don’t follow sports much but it was explained to me that Superdome is one of a few venues that hold the Super Bowl.
• The South is quiet, pretty and s…l…o…w. I quickly could imagine myself sitting on one of those grand porches in the Garden District in a swinging chair reading every afternoon…For maybe a month, maybe, before I went crazy! But it’s nice to dream.
• The Haves have and the Have Nots have not.
• There ain’t people that look like me down in them parts…

I strolled down St Charles Street and saw some of the most amazing homes and took a walk through Audubon Park all before lunch time on Sunday.

Before checking in, I decided to drive down to the Lower 9th Ward. And while people warned me that NOLA wasn’t the safest of places, growing up in NYC, I figured how bad could it be? Well in hindsight, it was one of the dumber things I’ve done.

The first house I saw once I drove over the canal was a gutted yellow home with an open door. So I got out to get a better look. What was astonishing was that the iconic x-like search symbol was still on a lot of houses 3 and a half years later. It was sad to see the have nots who have come back to claim their homes in the Lower 9th Ward live side by side with the constant reminder of this disaster. Some houses were re-built, some were gutted, others are still untouched and boarded up.

On two different occasions, a car would roll by mine very slowly letting me know that I was not welcome. After that, I didn’t get out of the car but I definitely felt like those cars were like the kids on roofs in movies and the whole community knew where I was. I had overstayed my welcome and I headed back to the touristy area of NOLA.

On the way back, I drove past a quiet railroad track and snapped a couple of shots.

All this in one day…stay tuned for the Monday’s adventure in the next post. For more pictures or a sneak peak, go look at the NOLA sets on my Flickr page.