Strange & Interesting

So... the Washington Post did a pretty interesting profile of Katherine Harris and her sputtering campaign for Senate in Florida today. The article is a very interesting read. I recommend it if you have a minute or two.

Bush Scares Babies

What else do you really need to say... he scares babies and makes them cry... apparently parents as well. Maybe the kid realizes how scary and crazy the recent smear talk is.

Democrats want the terrorists to win?!?!?! It makes me sick. It makes babies cry. Click the picture to see it up close.

Thanks AmericaBlog fort his pic!

Daylight Savings... Friggin Awesome

I'm just going to put this out there... I'm serious... I'm going out on a limb... I'm putting myself completely behind the following statement:

Daylight savings is friggin great. How wonderful is it that it gets light out earlier so that in the morning you feel all leasurely and whatnot. How much better is it that in the evenings it gets darker earlier so that you get the creeping feeling that you need to leave work right around 5pm rather than delaying and staying until 6 for no real reason.

Alright, it's fair to say that I might just be revealing tiny details about my own quirky time sensitivities. It's also probably fair to say that these effects will be fleating at best.

Still, I'm loving the whole daylight savings thing this week. It makes me happy. I feel like my mornings are very calm and bright and happy. I feel like the end of my work day stays a little more honest thanks to the darkness outside my office window.

All in all... it's like nature is keeping me in balance. Thanks nature and... um... the whole changing the clocks thing... which isn't so much nature as a social construction. Anyway, who cares, back to the beginning now, say it with me folks:

Daylight Savings... Friggin Awesome!!!

Kickball Field

Kickball Field 2
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

Today I was looking through some older pictures on my computer, and I found some from around when Lyndsey and I moved to DC. This picture is actually one I took the day that Lyndsey was moving into her group house in Mt. Pleasant.

I was down in DC for the day interviewing, and so I hung around and wandered while waiting to help her move in. I took random pictures around the area not knowing how these places would later connect to our lives.

Now I know this place as the home of many kickball games... the ugly and pockmarked field where many many people slightly twisted ankles and at least one person left mid-game in an ambulence due to an injury resulting from the crappy, completely uneven and outright dangerous playing surface.

I really love this picture for historical reasons, but just as much for artistic reasons as well. I like the urban/organic feeling it gives me... it's got rusty chain link fence, a run down field, poles and other very city things but all framed in by vines and leafy green trees. I hope you like it too.

Kevin, this one's for you!!!

Kevin This ones for you
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

Sometime in the past year Lyndsey and I gave, I think, one of the most amazing birthday gifts ever, and received one of the most amazing responses I've ever seen to gift giving.

One weekend evening, we got together with our Mustardite friends having just come back from Tyson's Corners Mall and we celebrated Kevin's birthday. All seemed relatively normal there was poker being played, there was cake being eaten, and eventually it came time for Kevin to open his gifts.

Lyndsey and I had decided to bestow on him a pair of bright read moonboots. He was bowled over. We were very pleased with how much he liked his gift. I think he was speechless for a remarkable amount of time.

This weekend, while in Boston, we came across a pair of super mini bright red moon boots, and Lyndsey posed for this picture on one condition, that I make sure Kevin saw it. Well... "The best way..." visitor, you join Kevin in witnessing the beauty of the moonboot. I hope you enjoy it. Happy Tuesday... or should we call it Moonday... like the one with two o's comes after the day with one.

Boston Trike Kid

On Sunday we were getting off the T at Harvard Square and we saw the kid pictured above. He and his dad got off the train and the kid immediately hopped on his tricycle and peddled down the platform. As they encountered stairs or obstacles, dad would take the trike, and the kid would go on foot until they got back to level ground.

All of this happened with no words exchanged, and it was awesome. I managed to get three reasonably good photos of the whole thing. They're above. Enjoy!!!

Revenge of the Wilford Brimley

Update... if you saw my earlier post and decided not to visit the Diabeetis website, you should, but more specifically you should visit the videos section here, and scroll down to the bottom.

Amazing. That's all I can say. Friggin amazing.

Wilford Brimley

Did anybody realize that Wilford Brimley was in the Ewok movie?

I know that I sure didn't. If you would like some more Wilford Brimley information, click on his picture above to visit his Wikipedia article. To summarize things you may not already know other than his Star Wars involvement, Brimley is a supporter of cockfiting, and he has popularized a mispronunciation of diabetes ("Diabeetis") to such an extent that it has spawned its own website. Great stuff.

More Boston Photos

Here are some more happy weekend pictures... and more to come soon!

Trapped by Condiments

Trapped by condiments
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

This time yesterday, I was sitting in the Rosebud diner in Boston, trapped by condiments, sipping my coffee. It's true. It's hard to eat when you're completely surrounded by salt, pepper, syrup, katsup, and all sorts of other shakers, tubes, caraffes, etc. Somehow, I made it through okay.

So, it's Monday, and I'm back with a bit of a buzz from a great weekend in Boston. Lyndsey and I got up there in record time on Friday evening, with even enough time and energy after our arrival to hop on the T and grab a drink with some friends before crashing for the evening and resting up for the next day's pumpkin-related activities (more pictures to follow... or go to my Flickr page for more).

Saturday we woke up bright and early... hmm... well, it was bright outside by the time we woke up, perhaps it's not fair to say it was early. We slowly made our way over to this cool bluesy bar that had grrreat brunch (asparagus and smoked gouda omlet with amazing hashbrowns and fresh-squeeezed OJ).

That jump-started everything and we followed up brunch with a visit to a punk-rock craft fair all before hopping in the car to drive up to Keene NH and see the pumpkin festival.

Now, I just read on Yahoo News that Boston actually unseated Keene as the world-record holder for number of jack-o-lanterns in one place. That made me sad, but I was happy to read in the same article that Keene had more pumpkins lit in town than the total number of residents in Keene... quite an accomplishment if you ask me.

The pumpkin festival displayed over 24,000 lit jack-o-lanterns, various foods and pastries, live music (including about a duo that was much like the White Stripes except that they were both roughly 10) and fireworks.

Sunday, we wandered a bit, grabbed some more good brunch (photo above) and visited the Head of the Charles, a large rowing extravaganza on the Charles River.

Rosebud Diner

Rosebud
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

So... my last post showed some mid-weekend pumpkin action, and this post is designed to give the second half of a quick Sunday-night update.

The Rosebud is where Lyndsey, Meghan and I had breakfast this morning. I had a great little scramble with broccoli and cheese... the ladies had burgers... all were very satisfied with the experience. The weekend up North was good fun, a quick trip, and generally a great time. More stories to follow, but for now, let me say this:

The weekend involved (in no particular order) superhero powers, photobooths, gourds of various sizes, apple donuts (they're probably not what you think), neon O'douls signs, head of the Charles, the Argyle Mall (many times over), Asparagus omlets, witches and many other random things.

Keene Jack-o-lanterns

Keene Jackolantern
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

Lyndsey and I went up to Boston this weekend with two goals:

see some good friends
get up to Keene NH for the Jack-o-lantern Festival

Mission Accomplished! Above is a very very very small snippet of the pumpkin-crazy festivities up in Keene... more to follow.

Fun was had by all.

Chest Hair With Mousy 1

Chest Hair With Mousy 1
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

This one is back by popular demand... there are more photos to come from this little portrait session... but for now here's number 2

Pool Periscope Baseball

Pool Baseball
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

So... with the post season upon us and a great series beween the Mets and Cardinals reaching its conclusion this evening, I thought I should post something baseball related on the olde blog.

Above you will find a fine example of a sport that was created this summer down in Hilton Head called Pool Periscope baseball. The version you see is the original form, where the pitcher tosses from the pool and the batter stands just beyond the steps into the shallow end.

Later adaptations shifted to place the batters box on the steps into the shallow end, and later the batter even moved further forward on the floor of the shallow end, with basepaths being set up around the periphery of the shallow end of the pool.

Other particulars include necessary equipment: 1 spongy soft small pool ball, and one periscope-type device that is at least 1.5 to 2 feet long for batting. Sun is also required. Games are not rain-or-shine... they really only work in very bright, direct, happy sunlight.

I hope you get a chance to play or observe a game one day for yourself... it really is pretty amazing. Until then, I hope that you're having a happy Thursday. If you ask me, any Thursday that includes Pool Periscope Baseball can't be bad!

Swelling

Giant Feet 2
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

Just after finishing up my work in DC mid-August, Lyndsey and I headed south to Hilton Head for a week off. We met up with her family, and my brother and Kristi, his fiance came up for the day as well.

Unfortunately soon after arriving, my left foot swelled up as though it belonged to the incredible hulk (see photo above). Luckily Lyndsey's nephew Andrew had the same problem so we muddled through the week with our rediculously large feet together.

Um... or we got up a few minutes after this picture was taken and our awesome giant sand-feet crumbled.

Which story is true? You be the judge.

Blue Sky

The Sky
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

It's Tuesday morning and another week seems to be grinding along quickly. Yesterday was a fun and low-key evening around here. I worked out while Lyndsey and her mom watched Inside Man. I caught the very end. I need to watch the rest sometime soon.

I also watched some West Wing while working out and then Studio 60 later, so it was quite the Aaron Sorkin evening.

This morning I'm excited for another good day, plus tonight is bargain night at the movies! If that's not a reason to be excited, I don't know what is.

Chest Hair in Love

Love
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

As an immediate more up-beat follow-up to my last posting, let me share the above photo, which shows, in my humble oppinion, the purest form of love. Kitty, fresh off killing his mousy cat toy and his mom, proudly looking on. Notice that Chester has thumbs. His mom is very proud of his thumbs

Dead Pineapple

Dead Pineapple
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

So... I suppose tropical fruit plants and October in Connecticut don't exactly mix. It is with sadness that I post news of the death of my pineapple plant. I am hoping to try again soon. I am very sad.

Chainsaw Lyndsey

Chuck and Chainsaw Lyndsey 2
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

So... it's Saturday and I just documented a truly excellent event, Lyndsey's first experience with a Chainsaw. She was truly a natural. I don't know what else to say. This photo shows the celebration after she finished up her first cut, creating two distinct pieces of fire wood for some day later this autumn.

It was quite a scene, and I'm happy to share it with you.

Any plans for your weekend??

Cuppage
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

I know that at this point it looks like I'll be volunteering with Habitat on Saturday morning, possibly fending for myself plans-wise Saturday night because Lyndsey will be attending her neice's girls-night/slumber 7th Birthday-party... that's a mouthful right?

Perhaps I'll go visit an antiques store or a thrift shop and search out odd objects like animal relics.

What about you? What will you be doing this weekend. I hope you'll be having fun, and perhaps we can all play some games... I've got a good weekend game idea... I call it, "Guess the next scandal to hit the Republican party." Any ideas???? If so, drop me a comment.

My guess as to the next scandal is this: Dick Cheny is, in fact, a robot. The scandal will break when some water spashes on him and he short-circuits, starts shooting innocent civilians with some sort of lazer beam (or perhaps with bird shot... just for old-times sake). Anyway, that's just an idea... I didn't really think about it very much or anything, so if you've got a better idea or story... like I said, post away, and have a GREAT WEEKEND!!!

Why Media Matters Rocks

First we saw Wolf Blitzer actually confronting people and asking hard questions on air, and now Media Matters goes and puts together a pretty great inventory of GOP Foley-related claims and attempts to smear Democrats and how many of these claims have gone unquestioned or investigated on-air. Interesting stuff. Also interesting is Fact Check's look at the Clinton Fox News conversation.

Overeager Smiling!

Funny Bar Group 2 BW
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

Somehow I always end up with a goofy smile or expression in photos. I'm sure that I'm not alone in this universe in feeling that this is the case. In fact, I'm quite sure that most people feel that they've got funny looks on their faces in most photos. Perhaps it explains why people seem to react to a camera the same way they might react to having a water pistol pointed at their face. They duck or scrunch or put their hands up to cover their faces.

The thing that cracks me up about the pictures I'm in is that most often I'm smiling in a rediculous huge way while everyone else in the frame has nice, normal, composed-looking smiles. It makes me laugh because invariably the first thought that comes to mind is, "whoa... what was I so happy about???"

The real treasures to me are the photos where this is not the case. They are the strange and rare photo where I actually look like a normal non-crazed human being. They also, however, include the even rarer photo like the one above where I'm in a group of equally smiley crazy people.

Thanks Loren and Lyndsey for helping me out in that department. You both are amazing, wonderful, beautiful and at least for the instant captured here completely overeagerly smiley ladies, and I love you both for it. (and for lots of other stuff too)

Death of Habeas Corpus

Keith Olbermann is amazing. He offers the best commentary I can find, and his show makes a habit of digging into issues and... actually investigating/reporting details and facts rather than simple sound bites. That general statement made, I was struck by a recent piece on Habeas Corpus. They do a pretty great dissection on why it's so troubling that recent legislation passed with even Democrats voting yea. UGH! That's my vote. Here's the link.

More DC Fun

Very Cool Accidental Picture
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

This is a random accident photo, but I like it a lot!

Tyler and Loren, you're both making great faces in the background, and I love that the focus is so strong on the plastic cup.

Enjoy, and visit my flickr page for more pics of Lyndsey and my recent trip to DC!!!

Habitat Annual Appeal Card Artwork

Habitat Annual Appeal Card Artwork
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

I made this drawing/digital image for the front of Habitat's Annual Appeal card. I'm pretty happy & proud of the work. I stayed up too late last night doing it and it ended up still needing tweeking today, but all-in-all it was a fun process. I'm hoping it helps bring in some good donations for the organization, and I certainly had a great time making it.

So... I was in Washington DC this weekend

Scary Helmut John
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

... and We had some fun.

It's not every visit to friends where you get to see good movies on a rainy Saturday, witness the Eagles in top form, and wear a helmet crafted out of an exploded water polo ball. No no folks... this trip to DC was quite some visit. Click on the photo to visit my Flickr page and see some other pictures from Lyndsey & my superfun trip back down to our Nation's Capital.

Back Up North

Oh, DC... what fun we had. This weekend Lyndsey and I visited DC and it was great fun. I was amazed by the number of people we got a chance to see in a scant 2.5 days. To everybody down there, thanks for putting us, putting up with us, and generally showing up and having fun. I am really very pleased that we made it back down so quickly and I really hope we can do the same again soon.

In the meantime I'll be uploading pictures from the trip soon and I'll probably photoshop some to make them all happy, clean, and whatnot then I'll upload to flickr. Once they're up I'll be sure to blog at least one over to here. Keep your eye out for that. Also, I learned of at least one friend in DC who has a blog coming along so hopefully I'll soon have even more info in the Friend Links section at the right of my blog ramblings. I'm pretty excited about that because I've been working to make my links section a little more interesting, full, and... um... nice. I hope you like it. New additions today include Matt & Kristi's wedding website, Liz Hamby's blog, Media Matters, Fact Check.org, RH Reality Check (Tyler's Employer) and um... I think that's it.

I think getting my blog connected to various stuff will help me stay interested in loggin on here and writing more. For now, I'm gonna get some lunch.

Mmm... Lunch.

Current Soundtrack: WFUV (Fordham University Radio) It's pretty great, generally speaking. Today I'm almost fed up with fund drive, but if I get completely fed up, I'll just switch back to Pandora where I was listening to Otis Redding Radio earlier.

DC or Bust!!

... and Lyndsey and I are heading down to DC any minute now! I'm all packed, and she's working on packing. It's pretty exciting to get ourselves back down to see friends so quickly.

We're both very pumped, and once the weekend is over, hopefully I'll have some good photos to post here.

In the meantime, my day was crazy! I updated the website for my organization, including changing the overall formatting such that I had to go in and fiddle with each and every page. It was time-consuming but fun. I'm looking forward to doing it again real soon.

Also, we polished off a grant that's been in the works for a few weeks. That was e-mailed out by me at the end of the day... then I shut down, called it a night, and hit the road.

.... more soon!

Happy FRIDAY!!!!!!!!

The Boys from Georgia Tech... They're CRAZY!!

The Boys from Georgia Tech... They're CRAZY!!
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

This is a photo I really like. It's from storytime at the winery. Geoff, Lyndsey, Bob and I were kicking back with a glass of wine and my brother's school triggered a great story of skydiving spring breakers... okay, so maybe it's hard to do the whole thing justice if you weren't there. Regardless, I hope you enjoy the picture, and remember, the Boys from Georgia Tech... They're CRAZY!!!!

Sam Cooke Radio

Today is supersunny here in CT, I'm reading tidbits about the Washington scandals, working away on getting set up for some fall fundraising stuff, and generally enjoying the happy light outside.

I'm also listening to Pandora, specifically a station I made that I seeded with just Sam Cooke. It's great. I highly recommend it.

Lyndsey's job hunt is cranking up and that's pretty great. I'm thinking of shifting my blog into a slightly different mode soon with maybe some fiction or basically more writing and less news of the day.

Other excitement: Lyndsey and I have everything booked to go down to Florida for my brother's wedding next month! That's right, next month! I need to start dreaming up a best man speech. Hmm... feel free to share some thoughts in the comments section!

- John