May Gray

The sun was already supposed to making its appearance when I left the house this morning at 5:45am. But it was a gray day. Not a speck of yellow, red or blue could be seen in the sky.

I thought the deal was that if I got up early to drive into work, I was supposed to be rewarded with a beautiful sunrise.

I left the house 10 minutes earlier than normal, but I hit a pocket of traffic that ate away my lead. On top of that I arrived at work only to find that I forgot the breakfast and lunch I had packed. Instead of being early, I ended up running a little late.

As I was walking to lunch, I got two calls, the second from a very unhappy client that resulted in me turning around and going back to the office to resolve the issue. Luckily I was able to make a few things happened and I rewarded myself by leaving for lunch a second time at which I, again, received another call, but this time was able to order and finish my meal.

I was exhausted by the time I got home. She looked like I felt.

And with that I say "goodnight!"

At The Hat

After church Brie had some prom preparation to take care of. I was planning to just hang out, do a little work and maybe make that trip out to the Santa Monica pier in that afternoon when I got a call from her asking me if I would go downtown with her to pick up her dress.

Umm...yes! It's always nice to still be wanted by your teenage daughter. She hadn't had lunch so we stopped at the Hat on Atlantic as we drove into downtown.

Brie ordered her usual, grilled cheese, fries and a cherry coke. I had already eaten so I just bummed fries off of her.

After I ordered, I stepped outside to take a few pictures since I had to wait for the food. Brie was in the car in case we needed to move it. Parking is at a premium at this location.

Bits and Pieces

Started the day off enjoying the morning sunshine in the backyard.

It was a perfect start to a very good day.

I was thinking about driving out to Santa Monica when mom asked if I wanted to go to a car show with her. Her cousin, Veronica, with whom she recently reconnected was going to have a booth there and invited mom. I surprised mom by saying yes.

But first I had to spend a little time with Belle.

Part of my Saturday routine is to sit on the floor and hang out with our lovey dovey.

Even though the Angel's have been playing horrible, I decided to sport my Angel shirt. They may be losers, but they are my losers! Funny enough I had a fair number of comments (good and bad) about my shirt.

The car show was not as spectacular as the one at church earlier this year, but it was spending the day with mom and her cousin.

Since we were in Duarte, a trip to The Old Spaghetti Factory was in order. Yummity, yum, yum, yum!

Picture Black and White

After much internal debate, first thing this morning, I joined Tracey Clark's class, Picture Black and White. I was sitting on the fence, biding my time in making a decision, but after converting some pictures I recently took to black and white and loving the results and after reading Tracey's post on Kim Klassen's blog yesterday, I jumped off and am diving right in.

Today's lesson is on lines...often we look for them, they draw our eyes into or across the photo. I was a bit stumped. What to do? What to do? I drove to Old Orange, planning on taking a picture of the Angel Motel in B&W, but not sure since that doesn't really have lines.

I ended up at the train station that I've always driven by. I was so happy. And I love the pictures in B&W better than in color. Love the timelessness of them. Love the lines. Love the stark contrast. Love. Love. Love.

In Search of Sunshine

It was another grey day today. At times a slight drizzle fell. I almost wished for rain so the blue skies would come. But nothing changed. I stayed home at lunch, trying to hold fast to my resolve to reduce my spending.

By five o'clock I decided to hunt for sunshine. I headed towards Huntington Beach not intent on doing anything but seeing if the skies had broken in the West. While it wasn't all sunny skies, it wasn't a dreary gray either.

At first I wasn't going to get out of the car and then I looked around and there was no one there! I could park pretty much anywhere I wanted. I quickly turned the car around, filled the parking meter with $3.00 for two hours and headed towards the water.

Cha Cha Cha

It was a gray day today. Gray from the moment the morning began, gray at lunchtime, gray on the drive home. Gray, gray, gray. I think the point is made. I didn't feel gray inside. Didn't really have the time, but I wasn't inspired to take hardly a picture today.

As I was reflecting on the day, I thought to myself, "I only took one picture today". But when I pulled out my cellphone, I found that I had forgotten about my first shot. It wasn't worth remembering, no wonder I forgot about it. I wasn't even going to post the picture, let alone write about it, but here I sit finding myself doing exactly the opposite of what I told myself I was going to do.

I took this as I sat at my desk in my gray cube at the office. I eat a banana almost every day. I like them on the green side. I like to cut the stem with a knife and peel the skin carefully back so that there is no bruising. I don't like bruises on my bananas.

But this isn't about bruises, or peeling or even about green bananas. It's about the little Chiquita sticker which inexplicably caught my eye. I was reminded to a time when I was little and how my sister, brothers and I would love to peel the Chiquita sticker off and stick it on ourselves. Why we got such joy out of the sticker, I don't know, but we did. And why this particular memory came back today, I don't know, but it did. So I did the only thing I could think of to preserve it, I took a crummy picture of it.

And that was picture number one.

The second picture? The one I was going to post? It was just a lame shot of the gray day as I waited in line at Costco for gas. That one is getting deleted.

The Perks of Working from Home

Ah, the benefits of working from home. With an abundance of fresh, sweet strawberries in the house, I was more than happy to whip up something a little special for lunch today.