Went out celebrating Fat Tuesday last night. As usual I had a great time making new friends,
and meeting up with old (Grand Niece Natalie and her best friend Dana).
For more pictures, click here.
Mr. & Mrs. Brian Bergquist
Their first intro as Mr & Mrs:
Record Snow
Spent much of the day digging out from the storm here. We got 20″, NYC got a record 27″. No pix, I was too busy, but Smashmouth kicked butt. Although I must confess, for this kind of big, kinda fluffy snow, a snowblower probably works better. Still better than shoveling.
See y’all friday.
Central Bucks West Basketball
I rarely watch live TV these days other than some live sports. I was just checking the TiVo guide to see if there was any B10 game currently on, so that I could warm up before the Penn State/Illinois game at 9PM (8PM Central) when I noticed that the Pennsylvania Cable Network’s High School Game of the Week was on – CB West at Norristown.
CB West and Norristown are two of the four teams all within a game of each other fighting for the Suburban League Continental Conference championship. CBW beat Norristown in their first game so this will be a grudge battle. I’ve seen a couple of CBW football games since I left town but this is the first basketball game of theirs that I’ve watched in over 40 years. I’ll report the final once the game is over (CBW leads 9-8 after 1Q).
PS – for those in the Chicago area the PSU/Ill game tonight is on WCIU. One of my best friends, Brian Allen, will be doing the color commentary for the broadcast.
FINAL SCORE: Norristown 62 CB West 51. That eliminates CB West from winning the conference but they still should make the state playoffs.
Reunion in August?
Seems Brian’s wedding will be another “near reunion”. But not quite.
So, I want to ask, “Can we re-unite ‘down-the-shore’ this summer?” We go to Brigantine, NJ every year, the week preceding Labor Day. This year that would be Aug 26 – Sept 2 (Sat. to Sat.).
I hope everyone remembers Brigantine. Larry may never have gone, but the rest of us, I think, did. There are 3 points I want to make that differentiate it a bit from most shore-towns:
• It is very family oriented, not a teen-scene (tho if you wander the beach “uptown”, I think the teens in the family could find some fun).
• It is one town north of Atlantic City, where one can find a variety of adult entertainment. Including (finally) some good restaurants.
• There is excellent golf nearby.
If we want to do this, we should be prepared to commit to house-rentals soon. I’ll do the legwork if it seems do-able.
FWIW, I may bring the family to Chi for Xmas-time ’06. After that, it may be some time before I’ll plan another trip. If we can’t reunite this summer, maybe Xmas-time could work.
Brian and Andrea’s new condo
Brian and Andrea just closed on their new condo in Wrigleyville…it is really sharp!
One of my favorites
Shannon’s 21st birthday. Gary and I flew in and teamed up with Ron and Steve to surprise her. We just walked into the bar where she was celebrating the birthday with her girlfriends. When she saw us, she did this double take that was almost as amazing as the look we got from Kenny when we surprised him for his birthday (or the look I got from Marilyn, Mary, and Mary Ann the time I surprised them at a Chippendales show). She then let out a scream and ran over to hug us. I’m sure her girlfriends didn’t have a clue what was going on.
More Halloween Moments
Natalie was exactly four and a half that Halloween. As cool as trick or treating was growing up in Chalfont, the block we lived on in SLC was a kid’s dream come true.
60 houses in a 2 block area…all lit up and well stocked with goodies. The kids made a huge haul in under an hour. But Larry ate most of it.
Did I ever tell you about Halloween 1992?
I haven’t just recently started dressing up for Halloween – I’ve been doing it for years. One of my favorites was a road trip to Utah in 1992 (Penn State/Utah football game). Niece Natalie (the real one) and I got to go trick or treating. I think we made quite the pair – Little Orphan Annie and Daddy Warbucks.
The trick or treating was easily my fondest memories of that weekend. Since then I’ve tried to block out any memories of the pasting the Utah handed the PSU football team. And I’ve also tried to block out memories of my feeble attempts to make a move on the newscaster at Ken’s station – she was a former Utah homecoming queen if I remember right. I tried to get her to make a bet on the game with me – when she blew me off I suggested a simple bet, maybe a coke or something – she declined that. Of course, I felt like a total idiot when Ken pulled me aside and said “Mormons don’t bet and Mormons don’t drink caffeine”. How was I to know?
However, Natalie saved the weekend. We had a blast going around the neighborhood. Who do you think is the cutest?
Ice Ice Baby
Just a follow up to my post yesterday on the First Night Festivities in State College. I went back down last night and took some more photos of the ice sculptures. Ice is a difficult subject to photograph. I tried three different approaches each of which has a unique perspective.
The daylight shots show the detail in the ice better than any of the others but just don’t capture the wet glistening look. The figures could be made out of plastic for all you can tell from the photos.
For the night shots, I tried taking photos both with the flash on and with it off. With the night shots, the ice takes on the transparent look that is missing from the daylight shots. The flash also gives you a nice glistening look that is missing from the other too approaches. Unfortunately, you lose some of the detail that you can see in the daylight shots. Also the flash overpowers much of the front lighting that the scene has and the result isn’t the same as it appears to the naked eye.
That leaves night shots without a flash. Of course that approach presents some exposure, focus, and camera shake challenges but they are overcomeable. Without the flash, you are able to see both the front and back light that is illuminating the scene. Unfortunately, I think the long exposures over accentuate the available light to the detriment of the subject itself. I think you lose too much detail in the subject (of course, it could just be that I wasn’t able to find the correct combination of lighting and exposure).
Here are some shots from yesterday that demonstrate what I am talking about.
First for completeness sake, yesterday I showed the preliminary ice sketch of the continental soldier, and I wanted to show you the finished product. Here’s yesterday’s daylight shot along with two photos from last night – first with, then without flash.
Here are some shots that really highlight the differences from the three approaches.
This sculpture is of Admiral Peary who is generally considered to be the first person to reach the North Pole (how appropriate for an ice sculpture).
This is probably my favorite shot from last night. It was taken with flash, and is just part of the Jeremy Rose/Afleet Alex sculpture.
I’ve update the online album by adding last nights photos. You can view both yesterday afternoon’s and last night’s photos by clicking here.