Here I Am

Date tonight!

2009-12-04T15:20:00.001-05:00

I'm going on a date tonight with Minna. WITHOUT KIDS! We'er probably going to go to Jackson Diner again since last time we went with the kids.

Minna's cake

2009-10-25T22:39:00.002-04:00

I made Minna a cake for her birthday. Recipe here.

I had a little extra left over so I made a really small cake using two ramekins. Then frosted in on an upside down ramekin.

My Siblings

2009-10-12T14:40:00.003-04:00

The two who started it all...

My 4th trip to Utah within two months

2009-10-10T22:03:00.002-04:00

Included working... But also this:

I was also able to meet up with some friends for a sort of Ricks College reunion for some excellent reminiscing. Rick, Jon, Barf, Tony. It had been too long.

Last night's flight

2009-10-08T19:00:00.001-04:00

Last night was crazy. I flew from JFK to SLC, but the headwinds were so strong the plane needed a fuel stop in Denver. We landed in Denver, taxied, fueled and the pilot announces there is a fault that occured during taxi, now they are working on that. We're not even at a gate, just a fueling station I guess. It's like a long road trip in a car and stopping for gas everyone gets up, stretches. I'm close to the front and I can see the captain on his cell phone and he keeps flipping switches. They power down the aircraft, to reset the system so no lights are on. But people's faces glow from cell phone screens. People are talking to each other more.

Personally this makes my trip here nearly moot, I'll probably miss most of the video taping I'm supposed to do. But, I'm not really bothered. I'm just tired and bored. A girl behind me who talks in a really loud voice normally continues to talk on the phone about all this. I can hear her above everyone else. And everyone else is doing the same thing.

Lights start turning off and on. There are chimes every 20 seconds or so. Finally, the Captain says that they are unable to fix the fault so we'll taxi to the gate and they'll be putting us up in a hotel for the night and we'll be off to SLC in the morning. Everyone groans.

We taxi to the gate and someone from Denver gets on and tells us how we'll get shuttled to the hotel. Then the pilot gets on and says that while taxiing the fault indicator turned off. They perform some system test and he says we're flying to SLC tonight. Nice. And off we went. We probably spent 2 hours in Denver.

I ended up getting to my hotel at about 4:30am. I'm tired.

In Utah this week

2009-09-19T00:10:00.003-04:00

I was in Salt Lake City, Utah for a day this week. Normally they give me a regular car but this time they gave me a Mustang convertible. So for lunch I took it for a drive up the canyon.

Target Practice

2009-08-23T16:46:00.002-04:00

I went with to scout camp for one night last week. They had a leadership shooting competition.

me shooting a .22 rifle

The rules for this competition were to shoot at the point of the V without actually touching any of the v. If your bullet touches the V that bullet is disqualified.

3 bullets were perfect around the point of the v. One was on the v and one was way out.

Not bad. As we all handed our targets into the judges I could see that I had really good chances of winning. Alas, I did not win. But since blogs are narcissistic I thought I'd show how well I think I did.

Rock rolling in Rhode Island

2009-08-12T21:57:00.001-04:00

Summer, I'm so glad you are here, and you ARE here.

2009-07-16T22:47:00.009-04:00

So far summer has been amazing.

We went camping.
We went to DC.

We went to the Pacific Northwest. My highlights are

1 Getting there: On the day we wanted to leave, I was taking care of church business that morning and got a flat tire... I was actually trying to get all my tasks done for Youth Conference so I could leave a day early, apparently I was supposed to stay.

So the day after we wanted to go, the flights were full. Finally waiting at the gate, one seat was available so Minna went to Seattle. The last one on the plane, she walked down the jetbridge and looked back at me holding Hannah and Jane's hands as they closed the doors. Anyway we ended up going to Portland, Oregon with no luggage (it went with Minna). We stayed with some friends (Wyatt and Britany), and went to church with them the next day. Hannah and Jane didn't have any church clothes. Oh well they'll just look out of place.

But amazingly at the last second before we walked out the door Hannah found some aprons, who knows where??, that worked as wrap skirts for the girls. They weren't perfect but they were better than shorts.

2 The Beach: What can I say. This is why we went.

It was wonderfully relaxing and easy going. The weather didn't really cooperate for flying kites so much but we were IN the Cannon Beach parade.

3 The Cape Mears Lighthouse: Lighthouses are just fun especially when they let you go to the top. But I wanted a nice kite aerial photo. I disregarded the nearby kite-eating trees, and 30 seconds into flying my kite. CHOMP, the tree took a bite of my kite. I was so embarrassed. A grown adult flying a kite next to a tree.

Well, what did you expect!? So I didn't want to lose this kite, it was kind of expensive. So I climbed the tree and pulled and yanked but in the end I had to cut the line.

The awesome part is that I was victorious over the tree, and I got an awesome wound.

4 Helping Minna back to NYC: My trip eventually ended and I went back to NY only to return to Seattle in a marathon flight weekend to go pick them up and fly back to NYC. This quick trip included a jaunt into Seattle to see our friends Tysha and Jacob. And a date with Minna at Lake Stevens, with a funny trip through the "Chicken Drive Through".

That's it then we came home.

This weekend: Harry Potter on Long Island!

Went to DC a while ago

2009-06-17T17:01:00.005-04:00

I wanted to post some awesome photos of the trip.

Four-wheel'n, Lincoln Monument, Washington Monument, and the Smithsonian

The Statue of Liberty

2009-05-24T18:09:00.003-04:00

We went to the Statue of Liberty yesterday.

It's a good thing we bought our "reserve" tickets online. We arrived at the dock only to find a line where the end couldn't be found. We walked up to the area that said reserve tickets and walked right through the metal detectors. Then onto our boat. Had we waited in line we probably would have waited about two hours. It was so awesome to not have to wait in line.

When we got on the island the girls got settled and I got in line for the monument. Just over an hour later I was climbing the steps to see inside Lady Liberty.

The inside is pretty cool. They have some pretty cool glass windows that allow you to see the inner structure of the statue.

This photos proves I was there.

The weather has been much better

2009-05-19T22:53:00.001-04:00

I had a most enjoyable ride home from work the other day.

Hannah made me lunch

2009-04-28T12:00:00.001-04:00

The other day as I was making packing my lunch for work. Hannah came in and said, "Here daddy, I have your lunch." It came complete with a cooling rack and everything.

I said, "Ok, thank you, please put it in my bag for me." And she did. So when I got to work, I had this delicious sandwich for lunch.

She takes such good care of me. Or at least I'm sure she will when I'm old.

Rokkaku kite

2009-04-27T21:33:00.005-04:00

The smaller versions are actually for kite fighting. But if you build them big and change up the bridle they are quite stable.

I wasn't able to hook a camera to it on this day. Sadly it was just too windy for a kite this big. It gave me a workout just holding it. The next day of course there was zero wind.

I was just happy that it would fly, and that the day was so awesome, and that we got out of the house, and that the girls enjoyed the day.

The kite is done

2009-04-24T10:34:00.001-04:00

It actually is bigger than it looks here.

Kite spars

2009-04-16T23:26:00.003-04:00

Getting the kites spars ready. The kite being 8 ft tall needs three separate sections to make up the spine of the kite. I have a graphite ferrule that I cut from a longer rod, that I've glued into a couple of the spars.

Epoxy, that stuff's crazy strong.

My kite

2009-04-09T09:00:00.002-04:00

It's big.

It takes up the entire living room floor.

You can see my mother-in-law's knees on the couch, for scale. I've finished sewing the pieces together, and adding reinforcement for the spars. I still have to sew on the pockets and a few other details.

Ham Radio

2009-04-08T21:22:00.002-04:00

I got my ham radio license a while back. My call sign is KC2UJK. Tonight was my first night talking on the radio. Kinda fun. I'm amazed how clear I could hear and talk to people miles away. I was only talking to these guys around the city, but I wouldn't have been able to do that with a regular walkie-talkie. I was using a Yaesu FT-60 HT with a repeater.

Jane bringing home the flowers

2009-04-02T23:39:00.003-04:00

We are trying hard to make sure we don't focus on the new baby so much that we forget about Hannah and Jane.

I took Jane to the florist and bought her and Hannah a flower each. Jane was a sight to see carrying flowers taller than she was. Of course she didn't want to look at it, she wanted to play with it. The flower barely made it through the day. There were little white pedals all over the house. Hannah was a little more conservative with hers, and kept it mostly in a vase.

Another day Hannah was up real early. I didn't want to wake everyone up so we went to Dunkin' Donuts and had a dount each for breakfast. When we got home she was bouncing off the walls from the sugar high.

A new kite

2009-03-31T12:28:00.000-04:00

I'm building an 8 ft tall kite. I'll be lifting a camera with this kite. More soon.

Baby Girl

2009-03-29T23:37:00.003-04:00

Minna already posted the story.

It's different, natural, weird, fun, tiring. We'll see if she continues to be so easy and calm. But I'm happy to report that after one day home she seems to be pretty easy to take care of.

For every newborn I meet, see, or help bring into the world. It always blows my mind how small they are. Even at 8lbs 4oz she's bigger than a lot of babies, but still so small.

Some people have said that she is "precious". Which is code for congratulations on your ugly baby. No worries. A camera can never capture the feeling of seeing a newborn, the size, the smell, the tiny cry, the little feet, the rooting. Not all newborns are cute, but I think my baby is.

I have three girls. I'm so outnumbered, soooo out numbered.

My time in the simulator

2009-03-05T20:53:00.003-05:00

I went to Orlando on business. While there I had the chance to fly in a flight simulator. It was the real deal simulating an Airbus 320.

It may have been a simulation but it was so amazingly real. It blew my mind as soon as we started taxiing. I just couldn't believe how real it felt.

I started by taxiing out to the runway. Hitting a few runway lights on the way. If you could have watched me it would have been like watching someone learning to drive a clutch for the first time.

Take off was easy. The bigger the airplane, the easier they are to fly. Landing, is a different story.

After avoiding other airplanes programmed to come right at me, the first thing we did is fly under the Verrazano Narrows bridge. I flew it so low, too low. I accidentally skipped on the water a bit. This would have caused millions of dollars in damages to the aircraft.

I made it under the bridge and then went for my first landing. I did ok on the approach but never really pulled up just before touching down. Actually that's somewhat of an understatement I died on my first landing. The simulator lurches and makes a loud sound and the screen turns red and everything turns quiet.

After resetting, I did a couple V1 take-offs which means that one engine fails at the most critical point during take-off, this means you don't have runway enough to reject the take-off, and you have to continue to take-off. Getting up to speed, the engine fails the airplane starts to veer sharply off the runway and you have to correct for that, using the foot pedals, then take-off. The first time I pretty much cleared out any lights and signage on the side of the runway, but with the help of the instructor I was still able to take-off. The next two times were much better.

I successfully landed twice (very hard landings).

After I was done my equilibrium was all out of whack. I had a headache, was a little dizzy for the rest of the night. It was totally worth it.

Interesting to me

2009-02-23T21:09:00.004-05:00

I find fun interesting stuff on the internet. I find things that I think other people would find funny. But instead of forwarding emails to people I'll just put it on my tumblelog.

Please view things here: http://dandyer.tumblr.com

I like it cause it is easy, minimalist, and I don't have to put any effort into the writing.

You can subscribe like a blog. If you don't find it interesting, oh well.

Dinner tonight with Minna

2009-02-13T20:51:00.006-05:00

...was delicious. We ate at Cabana. I had delicious Mahi-Mahi. She had shredded skirt steak.

Got published!

2009-02-09T18:04:00.001-05:00

Darren from Digital Photography School has just published an article I wrote, yeehaw!

Check it out here.

Stock trading

2009-02-04T16:19:00.002-05:00

I've been playing in the stock market recently. It's been quite a ride. I started with 10 million fake dollars and now I have about 8.5, and they are still fake dollars. I haven't really been doing very well. Anyone can trade fake dollars. You should try it too.

You can see my portfolio here.

It's really been more of a guessing game and listening to what other people in the community are doing. I've won some, and lost more. I'm glad it's not real money but I wish I had that kind of money to trade with.

How I love racquetball

2009-01-27T21:33:00.003-05:00

I have never played as much as when I played at Utah State. I hadn't played in probably two years when I started again with Alex. We're playing almost once a week, and it is great.

I love racquetball.

Chris Cottam

2009-01-17T21:20:00.002-05:00

The first friend I had when I moved to Reno at age 13. He hasn't changed one bit.

A short trip to Tahoe with Hannah

2008-12-31T00:12:00.003-05:00

One day during our stay in Reno there wasn't much to do and I wanted to go take photos at Tahoe. Minna and none of my siblings wanted to go for the drive. So I invited Hannah, who is pretty much up for anything.

We got out of the truck and it was really cold. I didn't want Hannah running around (we were at scenic outlook where lots of cars pull off) so I put down a sweatshirt on the snowbank and put some gloves on her and she sat there happily while I took photos.

This thing has arrows pointing to various sites around the lake. None of which you could see because of the fog. Hannah wanted to sit right there.

Sledding on Christmas Day

2008-12-27T12:07:00.002-05:00

This is Jane and I sledding on Christmas Day. She loved it, despite not having gloves or mittens. She laughed and laughed at Lucy (the dog) running along with us. It was such a fun snow day.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-26T22:13:00.003-05:00

The most memorable thing about this Christmas is the snow. We woke up to a few inches, we opened presents and it kept on snowing. Eventually we went out to play in the snow.

Skeet shooting

2008-12-24T18:14:00.002-05:00

I did ok for doing it twice in my life. I really enjoyed shooting this over-under shotgun.

We are related

2008-12-23T02:27:00.001-05:00

Sometimes I'm amazed at Hannah, she is so beautiful.

My mom's head injury

2008-12-22T00:01:00.002-05:00

My dad was watching Ben and I playing ping-pong in the garage and Minna came into let my dad know that there had been an accident.

We went in to find my mom sitting on the floor in pain. She had tripped backward and hit her head on an end table. There was a pool of blood on the floor and someone was holding a white cloth with red stains to her head. Her hands were tingly and she said she saw stars.

She cut her head open pretty good.

She refused to go to a doctor, so we called my brother the doctor and he recommended we put some stuff on it to hold the wound closed. That didn't work. We called our veterinarian friend and he sewed her head shut. We were all entertained as he was very handy at the needle and thread.

She is fine, and has been medicated and so she doesn't have a head ache. It's been quite a Sunday afternoon.

This photo is from when we were sending photos of the wound to Jeromy. And we took photos with a ruler. We were trying to see if he thought we should take her to the doctor.

All us kids were very impressed by her tolerance for pain.

An announcement

2008-12-18T10:53:00.005-05:00

I would like my three readers (all relatives) to know that I've started a new blog dedicated to taking quality photos with an inexpensive point-and-shoot camera.

Click here to go to my new blog.

I'm Twittering

2008-12-15T09:41:00.002-05:00

I'm finally doing this. http://twitter.com/dandyer

My Birthday

2008-12-13T12:44:00.007-05:00

I never really wrote anything about my birthday, so now I will... nearly three weeks later.

The Chiropractor
We started the day going to the chiropractor for Minna. I was happy to have her feel better. Her back was really bothering her.

Boom Noodle
Minna's parents took care of the kids. Minna and I went to Capital Hill in Seattle and ate at Boom. This delicious noodle place, where I had the biggest bowl of soup I think I've ever eaten.

Toy Store
Right around the corner from Boom was this awesome boutique toy store. We played with all sorts of toys. It's so fun to go into a toy store without kids.

The Movie
We watched Twilight. Which wasn't as good as the book. But the movie was entertaining.

At Home
We had a little celebration at home where Minna gave me a stove top grill! Minna's parents gave me the Planet Earth DVD set. I also received the first Horatio Hornblower book.

I really, really enjoyed my birthday. I had so much fun and it was all so stress free. It was one of the best birthdays I can remember.

Jane getting chocolatey

2008-12-04T21:58:00.000-05:00

After Thanksgiving

2008-11-29T10:22:00.000-05:00

On "Black Friday" I went with Minna's dad to get a couple Christmas trees. Hannah joined us an played a key role in the whole event. She kept our trees from getting "claimed" by others. It was raining.

Hannah and Papa with one tree.

Hannah and myself with another tree.

Hannah with the prize of the day.

I went into Manhattan for dinner

2008-11-20T08:36:00.001-05:00

I had a work dinner where we celebrated a recent finished project. I'm glad its done!

We ate near Times Square.

The only photo of the food. It was a tasty salad.

On my way home I was playing with my camera's timer setting, in the subway waiting for the train.

I had a good laugh at this today

2008-11-13T15:44:00.001-05:00

Fun with photobooth

2008-11-12T20:29:00.002-05:00

My commute home

2008-10-31T08:00:00.000-04:00

North - From Seattle to Albany

2008-10-30T08:44:00.000-04:00

I woke up really early and flew from Seattle to Albany. This was the first leg on my way the cold north. I would like to note that this was video taped was while Minna and I where dating, just a few months before I asked her to marry me.

Playing Hide 'n Seek with Hannah

2008-10-27T21:24:00.002-04:00

I find Hannah.

Hannah finds me.

Are YOU going to vote?

2008-10-27T11:43:00.002-04:00

Well are you?

Minna's Birthday Cake

2008-10-24T23:11:00.004-04:00

I've never really made cake before. I mean... I have, but not a layered cake, which is really what a real cake is.

Hannah helped me with mixing the frosting.

One thing about this recipe is that you should follow the directions about putting paper on the bottom of the pan before cooking. I didn't and the cake is so soft I had to insert two needles (attached to each other with string) around the sides of the pan and cut the cake away from the pan.

Did I mention how soft the cake is? You have to freeze it just to be able to work with it, as mentioned in the recipe.

Make sure to let the chocolate glaze cool, it helped with the thick dripping effect.
I'd also recommend keeping it in the fridge before slicing, otherwise you'll just mash the cake down.

This cake is found on my favorite food blog Smitten Kitchen

Happy Birthday to my amazing wife

2008-10-19T23:58:00.002-04:00

Minna is 34.
I love my wife.

Queens at Night

2008-10-10T21:38:00.006-04:00

I finally found out that the roof access in the other stairwell is open. I've been wanting to go out on our roof for a long time. My hope was to be able to see the lights of Manhattan. I can't, but I can see Queens pretty good.

You can barely see the building I work in. It's the building on the horizon that is right above where the lights of the train disappear.

This photo is actually looking east. The train streaking by is headed in the opposite direction toward Manhattan.

The big buildings on the left are apartment buildings.

umbrella in hurricane force winds

2008-10-07T09:52:00.004-04:00

Something I would love to try someday: umbrella + wind tunnel =

(cause when the wind blows at 80 mph an umbrella will help keep you dry)

found here

33 people named Dan Dyer

2008-09-26T12:45:00.002-04:00

HowManyOfMe.com

There are
33
people with my name in the U.S.A.

How many have your name?

But on Facebook there are 108 people that match "dan dyer". Check here.

Punched in the face

2008-09-24T22:59:00.004-04:00

I laughed. I love slow motion, especially for this type of wonderfulness.

Watch This

Found at kottke.org

The train by our house

2008-09-23T10:00:00.003-04:00

I just like this photo. Taken today while we were out for a walk with Minna and the girls.

A snack at the park

2008-09-21T22:06:00.005-04:00

On Saturday while Minna was busy I took the girls to the park. Even with playground equipment it's pretty easy to get them to sit down for food. They had these tiny little tables for little kids.

Chained to a bunkbed with a velociraptor

2008-09-17T15:21:00.001-04:00

1 minute, 19 seconds

Another day taking photos from a kite, with a twist ending

2008-09-07T14:24:00.004-04:00

It was just another normal day taking photos from a kite. Minna's cousin Amy was in town and we were all down at Rockaway Beach. This was just hours before hurricane Hanna swept across New York City. It was perfectly windy... or so I thought.

There were so many surfers. The waves were big and plentiful.

There was a really cool jetty that I walked out on. I got splashed a couple of times. You can see me in this photo.

With the kite still in the air, I walked it back to the beach. Where suddenly without warning it turned straight down and landed in the water.

The camera landed on the damp sand. And appears to be working fine. I had to fish the kite out of the ocean. Pulling on a kite in water is a hundred times harder than pulling on a kite in the air.

I'm glad the camera landed on the sand. The water would have been bad.

The kite still flew, it was just heavy with water. It's nylon and dried out pretty quick. The camera still has some sand in it but works fine, so no harm done. Just another story to tell.

Water temperature

2008-09-01T20:48:00.003-04:00

We don't control our water temperature. We live in a building with a boiler so it should be a little hot but isn't this excessive? (out of the tap)

The Carnival at Atlas Park

2008-08-30T00:24:00.004-04:00

This evening was really fun. We decided on the spur of the moment to go to this carnival and take the girls. They have never been to anything like it.

It was fun to ride the ferris wheel with Hannah. I think she might have been slightly nervous, or more like curious. You can see it in the video, as she realizes how awesome the ferris wheel is. You can see it all on her face, from the time we start moving...

Hannah on the Ferris Wheel

Sometimes just one thing...

2008-08-27T23:02:00.008-04:00

...can make you 10 times more cool than you really are. In my case, on this day a motorcycle did just that.

Luckily, Shane stopped recording just as I realized I was going too fast for the stop sign and skidded to a stop.

Hannah's view of seagulls.

2008-08-24T15:30:00.004-04:00

Hannah and I were having a talk on the bed and she was showing me how seagulls land in water (she was showing me how they do this by jumping straight up and landing on her bum on the bed).

"And then they splash in the the water, and go potty and [it] turns yellow"

Playing with Photo Booth

2008-08-21T23:51:00.000-04:00

The rest of the trip

2008-08-15T09:38:00.009-04:00

It's been so long since I went on a long road trip. And it's been so long since I was on a long road trip out west. Everything was beautiful and new.

We drove from Salt Lake City to Lava Hot Springs Idaho.

It was nice that Shane was driving. Minna and I shared the backseat with Hannah.

From the backseat I could see:
Large trucks

Kerianne

Shane

Pretty much the only things to do at Lava Hot Springs have to do with water.

We had a ton of fun with our Family. I just wish the reunion was a day longer, it would give me more time to get reacquainted with all my cousins. Not all of them were there and I still didn't even get to talk to some of them. Candice ended up posting a ton of photos of the reunion, go take a look. Be sure to scroll down and see the synchronized swimming routine video by our family.

Then back to Provo. One of the most fun things about the whole trip is when we went to "Jump On It" to entertain the little kids. Well needless to say Shane and I probably had more fun than they did.

It was also Sharalee's birthday while we were there. (HAPPY BIRTHDAY!)

At the end of our trip we went up into the mountains with Tony and his wife Jocelyn.

It was very muddy

We were up very high. It was very beautiful.

The remainder of the trip was filled with no sleeping red-eye flights. No one felt like taking any photos, so we have none.

I ended up taking a jumpseat from Salt Lake to Vegas, then taking a jumpseat again from Vegas to JFK. That was the red-eye portion. Then I tried to go to work the next day. Around lunch time I actually went into a conference room and took a little nap.

It was a hard trip but family is always worth it.

The photo album is here.

In Utah, before the family reunion, we...

2008-08-08T12:00:00.000-04:00

...fed ducks at a duck pond. You can see Jane trying to get in the water in the background. For her that was the whole point.

...took a walk up onto BYU campus.

...went up to Sundance, a very beautiful place.

...took a family photo.

...shane threw a bottle in the air for me to catch. I did not catch it. I was concentrating on taking the photo. Notice he is off the ground he threw it so hard.

...were told by Hannah that these are the flowers "for when mama gets married". She has already picked out flowers for her own wedding. I'm not sure how she learned that you pick flowers for a wedding at her age. We'll probably discuss the fact that mama is already married in the very near future.

...enjoyed the rain. Jane loves umbrellas. You can see her in the background of this photo. Shortly after this was taken we walked into the bike rental place and she knocked over a bike. I caught the bike with the umbrella between me and th bike. The bike was fine and Jane was fine, but the umbrella didn't make it.

T5

2008-08-08T09:36:00.001-04:00

On Sunday we were so tired...

2008-07-29T17:47:00.000-04:00

After church I took a little tiny nap and then I was a Chef the rest of the day.
We have had a surplus of eggs and blueberries since our visit to Costco and so I tried Blueberry soufflés. They turned out ok.

I started the dough for these cookies on Saturday and let it sit in the fridge for about a day and a half. The extra time apparently makes them better, I think it definitely helped in this case. These turned out fabulous.

On Saturday we went to...

2008-07-28T17:01:00.001-04:00

The ward BBQ and to the park. Minna was away all day taking photos in Patchogue. I'm sure you'll see the fruits of her labor in the next week or so.

I didn't get any BBQ pics. I was busy enough feeding the girls and myself. It was a little easier to keep the girls contained at the park.

On Friday I was not in the office

2008-07-27T21:50:00.001-04:00

I went to Governor's Island. I wanted to take some kite photos but it just wasn't the right conditions. So I watched Minna take photos of the girls, and enjoyed the view and the relaxed atmosphere only 800 yards from one of the busiest financial districts in the world.

Check out Minna's photos here and here

My photos are below

Our bike ride tonight

2008-07-11T21:45:00.004-04:00

Sometimes it is more work than fun, to have fun. Tonight it was about 50/50. Minna left on her run and we were going to meet at the store. Just after she left Hannah decided that she didn't want to wear her helmet. After negotiating her helmet back on and finally getting the trailer into an elevator that was empty we were on our way. Which was probably 30 minutes after I intended to leave. When Minna finally found us I swear she was about to call 911.

But once we got going it was all worth it. I had fun taking pictures while biking.

Hannah as a plastic bowl because she was sick yesterday and this morning. She threw up yesterday and she'd had a bowl as a constant companion. Don't they look cute in their helmets!

We're pretty sure she doesn't need the bowl anymore, but I think having it makes her feel important. Tonight, as I tucked her in bed, her final goodnight request was, "Can I have a water and a bowl."

Jane had fun too.

I took this photo seconds after I took the above photo.

Photos from above

2008-07-08T23:43:00.006-04:00

The first few days produced such nice weather there was not enough wind to fly my rig with my little kite. But finally at the end of the week there was enough wind. The album has the best of the photos.

Unfortunately we had another hard drive issue while away. The laptop drive went completely out. It was backed-up except for about 100 of my kite photography photos which I had just downloaded. Then it went out. I'm very sad about the loss because there were also some fun photos of Minna taking photos. These are the rest of the photos taken from the rest of the week that I didn't download on to the laptop.

See the photo album here

This is the house we stay in every year. As you can see it is right on the beach. We look out the window and see the beach. We walk out the door and we're on the beach. It's amazing.

Here we are.

We're back from Cannon Beach!

2008-07-08T00:10:00.002-04:00

Vacation, started... Check!

2008-06-29T11:51:00.002-04:00

Hannah and Jane were absolutely amazing yesterday.

Hannah started the day by throwing up.

Our flight at noon had seats available then no seats. So we switched flights. Then there were seats so we switched back.

We almost decided to bag the day flight and let Hannah get better and fly at night. But we gambled and took the noon flight and luckily Hannah didn't throw up. She was so patient and such a trooper the entire flight. Jane was buckled in her seat the whole time, except for 20 minutes of the 5 1/2 hour flight and yet hardly complained. They both received commendations from others. They very well behaved. It was a pleasure to fly with them.

We're not going backpacking anymore

2008-06-24T19:36:00.003-04:00

We made reservations for backpacking on the Wonderland Trail inMt Rainer National Park. We have decided, however, that logistics of us:

going to Cannon Beach for our annual Beard vacation
dropping the kids off in Seattle
getting ready for the hike
going on the hike
and getting back to NYC within my time-off limits

is just a lot to do. So we will not be able to use the reservation we have made. Sometimes it is just better to do less.

The reservation is for a round trip:
July 7 White River Campground Trailhead and Summerland Camp
July 8 Indian Bar Camp
July 9 White River Campground Trailhead

You can see on the above map where our reservation is. The trail goes down the right third of the map. Whitehead is near the top and Indian Bar is near the bottom. There is a bigger map here.

I understand it is a beautiful hike.

The reservation cost me $20 and I hate to see it go to waste. The reservation does not include the permit or fees for camping. It just means that you have a guaranteed spot (for up to 6 people) to make this hike.

If you want it call me or email me.

The Trains

2008-06-21T21:37:00.006-04:00

We can see and hear the trains outside our window, but it is much more dramatic to see them from the footbridge.

We cross the footbridge several times a week just passing through or as a destination. The great thing about having the trains so close is that it provides a perfect short walk when I get home from work or if the girls just need a few minutes to run.

Tonight we went on a walk to channel some hyper-activity just before bed. Hannah is wearing her pajamas and some dressy shoes.

Anyway, I don't think I've posted video of a train yet. So here you go.

Minna's favorite photo of mine

2008-06-21T17:53:00.002-04:00

Minna loves this photo, it's composition, color, the setting, everything. I love this photo because she loves this photo. There is a certain satisfaction that this photo brings me, in that she has tried to replicate this photo but never has been able to do so satisfactorily (in her opinion).

A story for Minna's photo assignment

2008-06-14T21:55:00.004-04:00

In an effort to dramatize this photo far beyond non-fiction and into the realm of fiction:

This one time there was a little kid who wanted a popsicle. So his mommy gave him a popsicle. He walked outside with it and a big dog was walking by and licked the popsicle. Since dog's have powerful tongues the popsicle was knocked out of the kid's hand. The popsicle landed on the ground. The end.

This is in response to Minna's photo assignment #14.

My first kite photography

2008-06-13T23:30:00.002-04:00

I bought a kit that included the kite, string and camera mount. And I bought a new camera. The contraption automatically takes a photo, then rotates the camera 30 degrees and repeats until you stop it.

Steps to be able to take photo with this kit:

1 Take apart servo and modify the gears to accept bigger diameter screw. This was amazingly tedious. Something I was not expecting.

2 Assemble the rig.

3 Hack camera, and install "firmware enhancement" so the camera can be triggered to take photos via usb, without pushing the button.

4 Assemble the kite using boy scout knots that I forgot.

5 Attach rig to kite string.

6 Try not to let my new camera collide with the ground.

7 Allow the camera to make a few rotations on the rig.

8 Reel camera back in.

7 Happily look through the treasure trove of photos.

Click and see the treasure trove here.

We finally put all our Ireland photos online

2008-06-11T17:42:00.001-04:00

You can see them here http://picasaweb.google.com/reydnad/Ireland

My favorite thing about camping the weekend AFTER Memorial Day

2008-06-09T19:39:00.003-04:00

We went camping in Ithaca a week ago. I wanted to show our awesome campground. I guess not so much that it was awesome but that there were very few people there with us. And that, my friends is the best thing about camping the weekend AFTER Memorial Day.

Minna also posted some pics. You should click on this link to look at them, they are great photos.

The good and eeevill side of Jane

2008-06-08T22:00:00.000-04:00

Jane has been so fun to teach new things to. We recently taught her the difference between a happy face and an angry face. She can now do them on command.

I took these photos on yet another outing to see the trains.

The happy face is easy, she does this without coaching. As for the angry face... At first she couldn't do it. All she did was keep looking at us and lower her chin suddenly. Eventually she started lowering her eye brows and it was so funny that it was hard to teach because we'd laugh and then she'd laugh, because we laughed. And nobody could look angry if they tried.

I don't grow a beard that often

2008-06-07T22:42:00.000-04:00

It's been a few years since I had a beard. This beard isn't even that much of a beard. But I usually have a clean shave. I'm about to shave it off so Minna took a photo for documentation purposes.

I will be combining hobbies

2008-06-06T13:03:00.000-04:00

I'm about to enter a new phase of life. I'm starting a new hobby... well not really. I'm combining two hobbies. Kites, and photography. Neither have been wholly consuming or anything. I mean I get paid to sometimes take photos for work and flying kites is just one way of becoming one with the wind (like sailing but less expensive, and without being in the water). I've enjoyed flying my kite every year at Cannon beach.

So add the two together and you get kite aerial photography. You can get an idea of the possibilities on flickr.

Upcoming events in which I am excited for include Cannon Beach and backpacking around Mt Rainier. Two wonderful opportunities for kite photography.

My self portrait

2008-06-05T23:12:00.000-04:00

In response to Minna's assignment...

I actually have a lot of self portraits. I don't think I'm self absorbed but I think it is fun. This shot was in a park in Ireland in May. I was trying to get me looking straight up so that you could see the solitary circle of concrete that I was standing on. I didn't get the circle very well but I think the photo of me turned out pretty good. I couldn't hold the camera up that high with one hand and still find a finger to push the button. So I put the camera on timer and held it by the lens.

Here's one I WISH I would have taken in Sacramento.

I always wondered about cars and when they die

2008-05-31T21:15:00.000-04:00

Way back, a long time ago I lived in Seattle.

I had a roomate named Bracan.

I got married we went to NY for a job.

Around the same time, Bracan got married and I sold my car to him.

A wonderful 92 Honda Accord. I loved that car. It had been stolen, broken into at least 3 times. Our family owned it from about 30,000 miles and I rolled 200,000 not long before I sold it. I had so many memories that included the car. It was very faithful to me.

Anyway, I think other members of my family might also be slightly attached to this car even though it is no longer ours.

While the verdict is yet out on the future of my old car, it looks pretty dead.

Please read the story of our good friends, the Williams, who recently had a non-typical day in my old car. While the car portion of the story is interesting, the pregnancy part of the story is a nail-biter.

I don't want to spoil it just go read it.

We live near the city

2008-05-25T21:21:00.000-04:00

This is how close we live to Manhattan.

My Sunday walk with Hannah

2008-05-25T16:41:00.000-04:00

Today we got home from church and Hannah was grumpy. She didn't want to do anything, but I did entice her outside with a homemade batch of bubbles. Minna and Jane were still sleeping so we decided to go for a walk.

We went to the park where I sometimes meet Minna and the girls for lunch.

Hannah took a photo of me.

Little did I know how many places hide-and-seek can be played. We played on the sidewalk. Hannah always told me where to hide. The tiny figure running toward me on the sidewalk is her. I snapped the shot while trying to hide in a shallow doorway.

This is when she found me.

There was a nice spot of grass that Hannah insisted we "jump" into. This grass was so plush we laid down in it.

What is out of place here?

2008-05-25T16:21:00.000-04:00

Inside our fridge.
This happened a while ago but I forgot to take the photos off our little camera.

We do keep peanut butter in the fridge so that is not the correct answer.

The most fulfilling part of our vacation

2008-05-18T08:31:00.000-04:00

We've returned from our grand trip to Ireland. Rested, relaxed.

Upon returning home we were greeted with hugs and excitement and laughter. We just hugged and hugged. The girls were so happy to see us. But I think we were more happy to see them. There was no need to be reacquainted, we started playing right away.

Hannah said the prayer for dinner and when I coached her to say thank you for mommy and daddy to come home, she added on "and I could be so happy". And she truly was happy that we were home.

Minna has posted some pics here and here already.

We're going to Ireland this Thursday!

2008-05-04T21:05:00.000-04:00

Leaving on Thursday be back on Monday.

Itinerary:
Cliffs of Moher
Galway
Dingle
Everything in-between

What we're doing to get ready:
Mostly stuff to help Minna's parents while they are here taking the kids.

The awesome-est part:
That we are just renting a car and we'll stay in bed and breakfast places wherever we feel like it.

photo by dusi_bbg

I found this video highly entertaining but you might not

2008-05-01T22:38:00.000-04:00

From Kottke.org (a blog I visit often)

If you only watch one metronome video in your life, make it this one.

There's something about the synchronization of metronomes that just made me laugh, outloud, a lot.

Jane fell asleep during lunch today

2008-04-27T17:31:00.001-04:00

She was so tired. I don't blame her. I was in the kitchen and Hannah starts saying her name, "jane... Jane... JANE... JAAAAANE!"

I walked in and found Jane asleep.

Gourmet Homemade Ravioli

2008-04-27T14:54:00.000-04:00

Since Minna is gone this weekend I decided to have a gourmet dinner. Joe came over with his pasta machine.

First you roll out the dough.

Then you add the ravioli filling (goat cheese with ricotta, basil, spinach, parmesean, garlic)

It was so easy, even Jane helped.

This is how the final product turned out.

The sauce was delicious made with chicken stock and pesto but there is no photo. Joe made the excellent dough and a great fennel salad, and Boston lettuce salad.

The girls were already done eating by the time the ravioli was ready, but Jane downed four more raviolis.

The swing was the best playground toy ever invented

2008-04-26T14:51:00.001-04:00

I'll tell you why there is no better way to play with your kids than using a swing.

Jane is actually pretty good at using a non-kiddie swing.

They don't run away from you.

It's really easy to make them laugh.

You can make a game out of it.

I would swing them and they would try to eat the Teddy Graham from my fingers on the up swing. After the Teddy Grahams were gone Hannah lost her flip-flop so I was trying to put her flip-flop back on while she was swinging. This caused an outpouring of laughter on all accounts. I was about to take a picture of this until Jane fell out of the swing.

Then we reversed roles and I was swinging and trying to get the grahams from Hannah. Jane was recovering in the stroller.

This morning was the perfect day at the beach

2008-04-25T22:56:00.000-04:00

The temperature was perfect, not hot, not cold.
The wind wasn't blasting sand in our eyes. It was just enough wind to keep the kite up.

This afternoon we took the bike and trailer for an errand and ended up at the park.

Hovering a thousand feet above the park were about 20 billion news helicopters with cameras pointed at the Queens County Courthouse where the Sean Bell verdict was announced. They were like mosquitoes.

Minna gets a break from the kids this weekend

2008-04-24T23:48:00.001-04:00

I have the girls this weekend. Starting tonight.

Bedtime was really easy. Hannah feel asleep on the couch just after 8pm.

Jane was not tired, I heard her playing with toys in the dark and then put her in bed with Hannah, and that seemed to work. I didn't hear her again.

When Hannah woke up crying I couldn't find Jane. She had fallen asleep by behind door.

The fun part of Boston

2008-04-23T21:26:00.000-04:00

Boston was awesome, except for the battle against my sinuses.

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We were hanging out with the ultra fun Truscotts.

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We did the Freedom Trail

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We played Wii.

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At 1am when Jane started to scream, I sat up with the Wii still on my mind, I was totally confused and referring to Jane and said, "I think we just need to change the settings".

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I climbed Bunker Hill Monument.

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We saw David and Debbie's fabulous new home two blocks from Bunker Monument, and ate all their delicious cookies.

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We went to the park on Sunday night even though I was feeling horrible, but it was probably the most fun part of the trip.

We entertained our wives and children by jumping over the fence. It was ridiculous.

Notice the excellent form by Tadd.

Gus wanted to be in the photo too so he stood in the background.

We changed Jane's settings and put her in "swing mode".

I'm sick of being sick

2008-04-21T00:15:00.000-04:00

I've been sick for probably three weeks now. It'll be my sinuses then my throat, then my sinuses again. Then I'll feel good and think it's all done. But not today. I feel horrible.

I'm having fun in Boston, but it's been a battle. Me being sick vs me having fun.

But I'm not just sick. Sleep was minimal last night since we're sleeping in the same room with the girls. Jane had a whopper of night last night and cried for a solid hour from about 1am-2am. I'm very tired.

At church today I felt like lying down on the floor of the wheelchair accessible bathroom to sleep. But, I was distracted by the Lost & Found closet which is in that bathroom. That, and the floor was tile and didn't look comfortable.

I was sneezing and blowing my nose all day.

This is how we store all those photos

2008-04-12T19:30:00.000-04:00

Minna received a question on how we store all her photos. Every awesome photographer needs a sidekick right. Well as her official photo sidekick I take care of all the technical details of storing the photos. She uses Lightroom and she has about 34,000 photos and this is how we store them all. We do this all on a Mac.

Right now we keep everything on an external drive. This image represents all the data on our external drive. Although you probably can't see them, every little square left of the yellow line is a photo. Everything to the right is something else, mostly video. (I used Disk Inventory to create these images.)
Here is a closer look so you can see all the different squares.

The photos require about 140 of the 150 gigs of space. We have been keeping them on a RAID 1 external drive from CalDigit.

RAID 1 just means there are two disks inside the external drive that mirror each other so if one disk goes bad the other one serves as a backup.

If I were completely paranoid, I would get a third disk and store one at work switching them out every other day or so. That way if our apartment building burned to the ground we'd still have the photos, but probably nothing else.

The problem is that we're about to run out of space on this external drive. So I'm going to change how it works.

First, I've purchased a D-Link DNS-323. It's a storage device that connects to our computer via our wireless router. I like this because this little device hides on the shelf with the router and doesn't take up more space on the desk.

Soon, I'm going to change the RAID 1 external drive to be a RAID 0, which means the two disks inside the CalDigit device will work together to store and retrieve photos, but not mirror each other. This will improve performance and because the disks won't be mirrored it will double storage capacity, but if one of the disks inside fails, all photos on both disks will be lost. But that is why we bought the DNS-323. As soon as I get all the bugs worked out of backing up the external RAID drive to the network drive, and everything is backed up flawlessly for a couple nights in a row I'll make the RAID switch.

There aren't really any bugs in my backup system. I'm using and highly recommend backuplist+. It's free and works fantastic. The main problem is my wireless connection isn't stable enough to backup 150 gigs without a hitch.

The downside to this photo storage system is that we can't take it on the road, because the external drive is not mobile.

So there you have it. We have a ton of photos that are completely backed up, and that's how we do it.

It's getting warmer!

2008-04-12T19:01:00.000-04:00

I took the girls out for a spin today. We went to the park and it was packed.

Jane was loving the slides. She was very confident and going down them all by herself. I would stand at the bottom and clap my hands until she went. She seemed pretty unfazed by it each time and just wanted to go again. On the twisty slide she always started feet first and finished head first.

Hannah laughed and laughed at a boy a couple years older than her who kept fake falling off the ladder just to make her laugh.

My sister is evil

2008-04-06T15:22:00.000-04:00

This is my evil sister.

On April 1, she posted her decision about which school to go to for her Master's in Social Work. I knew she had applied to more than one school but I wasn't too concerned about the schools she applied to.

All us siblings have done our share of traveling, especially her. She's been Guatemala, London and been a Trail Walker with the Anasazi Foundation in Arizona. So she is all about adventure.

When she announced her decision to go to China for her MSW. I had not heard about the application but was not surprised that she would seek the opportunity. But for two years? That's a long time, and she would be away from boys that she could date and marry (yes, I'm opinionated about that). So, I wanted to see what her motivation was. I called her right then.

Bits of our conversation:

Keri:..."You're totally not excited for me?!"
Me:..."I'm excited for you, its just a long time."

I'm still thinking in my head. Wow she'll come back and be totally awesome at speaking Chinese. And... I wonder how expensive it would be to visit her while she's there.

Finally near the end she said, "I'm so glad you called, cause it's just an April Fools joke."

I can't believe it and I fell for it so hard that I called her. Well done. Just wait until next year.

Minna's assignment

2008-03-31T16:59:00.000-04:00

Here is my take on Minna's assignment.

I took this for work. It is a bunch of empty aircraft galley bins. I'm not sure it's the kind of "pattern" you may have been thinking of but there is repetition. Kind of a random repetition. Anyway I found it slightly interesting, just enough to post it.