The Flamingourd
I got to come home early this weekend, in time to go to karaoke Thursday night with Danie, and surprise our small group by showing up mid-week. Then I actually got to sleep in Friday morning, and we went to lunch and the mall, and Danie went off to compete in the Doctor Idol contest at Michael’s on East in Sarasota. Her group won, of course, and then we watched 1408 that night. This is, quite possibly, the single creepiest film I’ve ever watched.
Danielle singing at Bayfest 2009
Today Danielle was singing at Bayfest out on Anna Maria Island, and I went to photograph her and her band, Highway 41. The festival was out on Pine Ave, towards the North end of the island, and parking was a mess. The messiest part, of course, was that it was impossible to tell as you drew nearer and nearer to Pine Ave, how far you could go before you’d have to try and turn around because all the parking was full. I got lucky and tried my luck with a lot about two blocks away from the street itself, where I managed to snag a spot that wasn’t too far away…and the last lot with any available spaces up to Pine Ave, as near as I could tell.
Some horse shoes from the beach baptism
Today I shot some baptisms at the beach, and assorted activities beforehand. I started the day running video at church, as usual, and ended up volunteering to show up and shoot the event at Coquina Beach later. So I bought a new book (David Weber’s By Heresies Distressed), lazed around reading for a while, and headed out to the beach. I had fun shooting some volleyball, horse shoes and so on, and eventually got to battle it out with the sun shooting baptisms in the water with the sun about ten degrees up off the horizon directly behind them. I had someone out in the water holding a strobe, but it was still nigh-well impossible to get a decent exposure. I was able to get them looking alright with a little post-processing, but with the strobe at full power I only got one shot each (it takes a good two and a half to three seconds to recharge after a full-power flash), and some of the expressions turned out…interestingly.
Danie, in the Halloween spirit
Today was my girlfriend and I’s 31/12 anniversary (that’s two years, seven months for the math impaired). I went and ran video at church, like a normal Sunday, and then grabbed some Taco Bell, went home and ate it, expecting to meet up with Danielle later…but she surprised me and showed up at the door. We went off to see Zombieland, which was pretty enjoyable, and then ended up spending pretty much the entire day hanging around the house.
Emily under the Go-Kart bridge
When I was a kid in Bradenton, by far the coolest thing to do in town was hanging out at Pirate’s Cove. It was one of those arcade/go-kart/laser tag kinds of places, and it was a pretty good one at that. At one point they even had a Shake Pit (a local ice-cream place), the only time Shake Pit ever had a second location. Unfortunately, the mini adventure park type of establishment has really fallen out of favor, and a couple of years ago Pirate’s Cove closed its doors. The owner had intended to sell the property, but that deal fell through, and after everything in the place was auctioned off they boarded up the building and left the property unmaintained. It’s been several years now, everything is overgrown and destroyed, and I decided to go back for a photo shoot.