Let the sale begin!

So this weekend is our annual community garage sale weekend.  An opportunity to lay out our fabulous junk for would-be treasure seekers.  Unlike most folks I don't usually determine the success of a garage sale in terms of how much money we make.  Typically if I'm able to unload that one god-awful item that would just as easily find a home at a local landfill then as far as I'm concerned that garage sale was a success.  But making a few bucks is definitely foremost on my mind.  Not because I'm wanting to roll around like Demi Moore, semi-naked on a bed of dollar bills.  No, more so because whatever profit we might make selling our stuff my darling wife is usually spending it on other people's unwanted treasures.  But to be fair she usually does find some pretty cool stuff with the exception of that treadmill that is still sitting in our basement, unused since the day she bought it.  I'm sure we could decorate it with planters or some other adorable creation from DIY's "Rehad Addict".  Oh well....

So come on over.  Give us the opportunity to move our crap into your garage to go along with all your crap.  Come on, daddy needs wine!

Grow, baby, grow!

It occured to me that a lawn to a home owner is like hair to a middle aged man.  It grows where you don't want it and won't grow where you need it. I've tried several versions of Rogaine for lawns but I still have random patches of bare spots that stick out like a 45 year old at a 20 something bar. I've considered grass comb overs but all the other lawns just laugh and there's nothing more pathetic than an emascalated lawn.  Miracle Grow, Revive and an assorted mix of Viagra for grass haven't done much to stimulate growth.  I read somewhere that you should speak to your plants with a soothing and nurturing voice in order to help them grow.  Well I figure the same could be said for my lawn but even my best Marvin Gaye and Barry White couldn't get these blades of green to stand tall and firm.  Oh well, I'll keep plugging away because when it come to lush, green grass size DOES matter.

A Peace of Work...

I've got a question for you - have you ever prayed for your enemy?  Ok, so maybe you're not a praying person.  Well, have you ever extended compassionate thoughts towards those that make a career out of pissing you off?  Think about that for a moment while I sip my coffee......

Oh, you're back.  Well?  Hmm, just as I thought.  Ok, so maybe some of you have but I would venture a bet that most of you haven't.  It's a weird thing to extend a prayer or positive energy to those that seem hell bent on making our lives miserable.  And regardless of your spiritual upbringing, it's not instinctual to reach out to others when we've been hurt.  Normally when we've been wronged we typically turn inwards.  We tend to our wounds and either continue to wallow in our suffering or go on the offensive.

We all have similar cast of characters in our lives which usually includes at least one villain.  Perhaps it's that co-worker or boss that seems to snipe at you at every turn.  Maybe it's the friend or family member that always tries to one up you.  Or maybe it's just that customer service rep at a local store that makes you feel like total crap when you're trying to return something.  Regardless, these people need our prayers a lot more than they need our ire.  Yeah, I know.  That's a tough one to swallow.

For years when life was throwing fastballs at my head I use to pray to God to make my life right.  It was always about wanting Him to fix me, take care of me, make all things better for me.  Not once did I ever consider my adversary.  But I would say it was probably about 10 years ago or so that I was given some sage advice.  Instead of praying for my life to be better, I started praying for those that would cause me the most hurt.  I'll be honest those first few prayers were more along the lines of "Dear God, please help that guy pull his head out of his ass."  But when I really meditated on it my thoughts and prayers just focused on asking God to give that person peace.  Think about it.  That person is probably harboring some level of anger or resentment that may or may not have anything to do with you but unfortunately you're at ground zero of their bitterness.  But just asking God to bless them, to help them overcome whatever it is that's making them so miserable, does so much more than you think.

When someone is crying you'll naturally want to reach out and provide an assuring hug and comforting words but when someone's angry you probably want to seek cover.  Whether that person is crying or yelling they're still hurting inside and they need our compassion and understanding more than ever.  It's hard to think that way when someone is truly being mean towards you but what are your alternatives?  Being angry right back at them?  Giving in to the resentment and hate that is consuming them?  Remember, when they're lashing out and attacking any and all that's in their path, it really is a cry for help.  I know that sounds cliché but it's true and it takes a lot of courage on our part to rise above all that anger and be the strong person.  You may feel your efforts are in vain but I can guarantee you that somewhere down the road that person will have an epiphany and will think back on people like you and will be grateful that you stood in the face of their wrath and still extended a compassionate hand.

So just make a promise to yourself today.  Promise that the moment someone does something hurtful towards you, think first about them and what's hurting them that's causing them to act the way they do.  It won't be easy, believe me, but the road to recovery and reconciliation is seldom a smooth one.

"If you had to choose..."

As a kid did you ever play that game where you'd asked each other "If you had to choose...."?  Usually it involved having to choose between two disgusting or painful options.  "Would you rather eat a worm or a cockroach?"  "Would you rather get kicked in the nuts or punched in the face?"  I guess it's not really a game.  It was really more of a way of determining each others  pain or disgust thresholds which someday you would use against them in a never ending quest to torment each other.  Ah youth!

Just the other day this little game popped into my head.  I have no idea why.  My mind usually races from one random thought to another.  But any ways the question came to mind, "Would I rather be considered a loser or a quitter?"  Hmm, an interesting choice.  I think the choice for me would be pretty easy but I wonder what others might pick for themselves.  I think some folks confuse the two options and I know many use them interchangeably when clearly they are not the same.

For me I would pick "Loser".  I know, there are a number of you out there that are saying, "Dude, you made that choice YEARS ago."  Yeah, whatever.  But to me loser implies you tried and failed to achieve something.  You took on a challenge, put your best foot forward, used all your personal resources to perform at your absolute best but you failed to achieve the goal you had set for yourself.  Winning and losing are a part of life.  We commit to something and it either goes our way or it doesn't.  What matters is that we did our absolute best, that we saw it through to the bitter end and we either celebrated our victory or sulked in our defeat.  But no matter what the outcome we stood in the ring and fought the good fight.

Now "Quitter" is another matter.  To me it implies someone who started something but CHOSE not to finish.  For some folks when things get too hard, when they encounter that first bit of resistance, when something or someone stands in their way they give up.  Now don't confuse quitting with failing.  The best way for me to distinguish between the two is that failing means you put everything on the line but failed to achieve your objective whereas with quitting you still have "gas in the tank" but choose not to go the distance.  Sometimes you have to admit that a relationship or a job has run it's course and you need to move on.  Accept that it didn't go as planned, that you put everything you had into it but it simply failed.  Beware of quitting, though.  Quitting is like a drug.  You do it once and eventually it becomes easier and easier to do.  After getting over that initial sting of shame, giving up on your dreams and ambitions becomes as easy as breathing.  And like a drug it gets to the point where you depend on it.  You'll eventually quit at nearly everything in
life - your job, your relationships, your faith, your integrity, the list goes on.  Don't ever give up on something when you know deep down inside you still have so much more to put out there.  Yeah I know, it takes a bit more courage and a willingness to endure a bit more pain but trust me that pain is nothing compared to the shame of just giving up.

So by all means call me a loser.  Let me fail at every endeavor and let me come in last in every race.  I will gladly embrace every loss as long as I don't have to live with being a quitter.

Clearing house...

So I was going through one of my old external hard drives trying to clear out some space so I can start backing up my current photos.  HOLY CRAP!  Did I take a LOT of shitty pictures over the years!   Hey, I'll call a spade a spade.  My photos REALLY sucked back in the day.  And no, I'm not going to share any of those with you.  Suffice it to say I had no business being behind a camera.

I read something a while back or maybe my wife told me, but it's a Feng shui thing where one should throw away things that are broken.  I guess it's like a negative energy thing.  If you keep broken appliances or dead plants in your house then you're surrounding yourself with negativity.  Now I might argue the point when it comes to that perfect fitting, faded pair of jeans or grandpa's old, and broken, pocket watch.  There are some things where sentimentality wins out.  But that old blender or those wilted flowers need to go the way of the dodo when they no longer serve their purpose.  My old photos are no different.  Amazing how many crappy photos I had.  I cleared out over 100GB of photographs that I'd taken since 2005 and I'm still not done purging that hard drive.

As I looked at all those photos I thought to myself, "Wow, thousands of shutter clicks died in order to get that one picture."  To be honest, many of those "final" photos were nothing more than godawful snap shots.  I remember at one time thinking that I would hold on to all these photos because I was going to re-edit them or at least keep them for posterity to show how far I've come.  Well, unlike our

old school yearbooks or early family photos, there is nothing remotely worthwhile in keeping old crappy ass pictures.  If I could go back in time and talk to myself while I was taking those pictures I'd probably say, "What the F**k are you doing?"  I remember thinking at the time I was getting some great shots.  Wow, I should've been tested for banned substances.  I don't know what was worse, the poor quality RAW images or the over-Photoshoped finals.  I'd like to think my photography has gotten better but I'll have to wait and ask myself that in a few years.  Hopefully when I'm purging my old photos then I won't feel nearly as much shame as I do now.

The seasons change.  Plants grow and then die.  Clothes fade and wear out.  Each year we clear out our garages and our yards in order to make room for all the new stuff and before we know it all the new stuff becomes old and eventually must go.  Some relationships are the same.  There are those those that will stay with us for years to come, kinda like those perennials we planted years ago.  Others might be more like annuals.  We enjoy them for a particular time or season in our life but eventually they wither away but it doesn't mean they are any less special then those that are with us year after year.  I'm not trying to be cavalier or insensitive about this but I think it's ok that some folks only make guest appearances as opposed to those that are reoccurring characters in the story of our lives.

So some photos I'll keep forever, or as long as the "1's" and "0's"stay aligned on my computer.  Others I'll dump almost as quickly as I take them.  But no matter how long they stay with me I'm glad I took them all.  Every one marks a time in my life and in my personal growth as a photographer.  The same can be said for all the relationships I've experienced in my life.  I'm grateful for those that have endured the years with me as well as those that have been with me for what seems only a fleeting moment.  I might cringe at that old crappy photo I took or think upon a friendship that withered away years ago but I have no regrets.  They were all episodes in this TV series of life.  Here's hoping my personal sitcom doesn't get cancelled any time soon.

Tools of the trade...

With the proliferation of smartphones and tablet devices that have built in cameras the population of photographers has grown exponentially over the years.  Just take a gander at Facebook and Google+ for proof.  I know there are many professional photographers out there that bristle at these wannabe artists intruding on their craft. I for one welcome these new expressionists because everyone has an artistic side that's just dying to come out and today's photography landscape offers us that outlet.  Now to be clear not everyone that posts photos is trying to be an artist.  Most just want to share what they had for dinner or show off that planter box they created from Pinterest.  But there are those that take and post photos throughout the day as if the social media world is their personal gallery.  No discriminating between the quality of the photographs. Just point, click and post.  Its with many of them I question their artistic integrity. It seems there's this sense of urgency to post as much as they can with little to no thought on producing something meaningful and interesting.  I'm not saying these folks need to stop taking pictures. On the contrary, I really want to see their work. What I hope to see are more folks putting just a little more effort in their art. 

There are far too many tools and resources available at the touch of a touch screen to account for such shoddy pictures being splashed across social media. Aside from the duck face bimbo mirror shots, the semi-scenic and portrait photos are the most popular and it kills me that if the photographer would've taken just 60 seconds to crop and auto-enhance the picture (these tools are embedded in every camera phone), they would've had an "Oh!" instead of an "eh" photograph. 

Listen up, folks.  If you're going to take the time to photograph everything in front of you, then you owe it to you, your viewers and your craft to take the best photos you can. Now you may argue that you don't have time or money to take classes or buy all this great gear and software but I'm here to tell you you DO have time and as far as money goes damn near everything you need to be a good photographer is virtually free.  There are scores of how-to photo sites on the Internet and most all decent photo apps are either free or a couple dollars. Trust me you're blowing more money on foofy coffee drinks then you would on a simple enhancement tool.  

Photo apps are only one part of the equation. Knowing the fundamentals of photography is key to taking good pictures.  Now you don't necessarily need to know all the technical details of ISO or how to adjust your shutter or f-stop settings. With your camera phone most of that is all auto mode any way. But knowing a bit about composition, the rule of thirds and perspective will go a long way in helping you capture the best image possible.  I subscribe to a couple of free photography newsletters, Digital Photography School is my favorite, and the amount and quality of info they provide would've only been available to paying college students 10 years ago. This stuff is free (donations accepted) so there's no excuse for not using them.  

So many of you have a great artistic eye and knowing the tools available to you and using them in moderation will definitely take your art to the next level. Never stop taking pictures but more importantly never stop learning and growing in your craft. Share your very best so that we all can enjoy the experiences you've captured.  

Be creative, be you!!

NOTE:  The attached photo is an example of what anyone can do with their photos. Yeah, the subject is blah. I took this from my hotel room. All I did to bring a little pop to the pic were a few minor cropping, exposure, saturation and sharpening adjustments using a tool called Snapseed ($1.99). Took me less than a minute to process.  

Time for me to fly...

Boy you know it's a friggin', frackin' early flight when TSA hasn't even shown up. I do enjoy travel to the east coast but its almost always a long day of travel.  It's like being in a constant state of fatigue from having to get up at 0'dark 30 to finally making it to your hotel room that night. Ahhhh the joys of travel.  

I hear some old folks talk about the days when air travel was fun. Yeah I vaguely remember those.  For the most part people dressed nice. As I say that I notice I'm wearing a t-shirt, jeans and dirty hiking shoes. No matter how short the flight EVERYONE got something to eat and drink and sometimes seconds if there was extra.  Kids got little plastic flight wings and if they were good they might get to visit the cockpit.  Not every seat was taken so you usually had a chance to spread out.  Planes actually carried assorted magazines and playing cards to help pass the time.  The headsets they gave you were usually kind of big and clunky but you could pretend you were a mission controller on an Apollo moon flight as you flip through all of the audio channels.  Flight attendants were absolutely gorgeous. Ahhh I had many a crush on those airline angels.  What happen to those glory days?

Nowadays the service is short on amenities as the flight attendants are long in the tooth.  The seats are small and the security lines are long.  We no longer enjoy going to the airport.  Now we just want to get through it, like its some kind of hazing gauntlet where we're strip of our clothes as well as our dignity. Yeah that big business exec doesn't look so intimidating standing in his socks holding his belt, shoes and computer bag.  

Oh well what can you do?  Give me a road trip any day!  Oop, gotta go. Flight's boarding....

Full of it...

As the great Keith Jackson would say, "Whoa, Nellie!"  That was my response stepping out of bed this morning.    Every muscle reminding me I DIDN'T sit on my ass all day yesterday.  Far from it.  Actually I don't think I reclined at any time until in the early evening.  

Yesterday was a gorgeous Spring day in Colorado.  A far cry from the winter mornings we've been experiencing for the last several months.  We had a pretty full agenda but first things first.  After some snuggle time with mutts in the morning, we got up, consumed the required amounts of coffee, packed our cameras and made our way to south Boulder to hike along Mesa Trail.  A pristine morning, not too cool and not too warm.  Julie got some amazing shots of the local wildlife.  Sophie got to flop and twist in the few patches of snow that remained.  As for me, no great photos but I did have a wonderful time with my two of favorite ladies.  

On our way home from the hike we made a quick detour over to the spa shop to get some chemicals (damn kids and their lotions), and worked out a game plan for the yard work that was forthcoming.  After dropping of a sleepy Sophie we ventured over to Home Depot, the Mecca for all things homey.  Given this was one of the first good Spring days in Colorado we had to remind ourselves that the Depot would be crawling with the suburban zombies.  You know who I'm talking about.  The scores of people who have no idea what they're doing, what they need, how they got there or what zip code they live in.  They're also the very same folks that bring along their six screaming, meandering kids as well as their cujo dog.  By they way, who the HELL brings a dog to go shopping, especially at a home improvement store?  

Well this venture was all about the yard.  Rolling the dice that we'd no longer have snow in our immediate future we picked up several plants and flowers to help bring some color to our otherwise drab, sepia looking backyard.  Now you might be asking how I could be so sore from buying and planting a bunch of flowers and what not.  Well I'll tell ya.  We kinda got the wild idea to putting down mulch for the garden areas of our yard.  Now keep in mind we have HUGE garden areas.  Long story short, we ended up making TWO trips to HD in order to bring home some 30 bags of mulch.   Mother puss bucket!  Funny, during the first trip I had three different guys ask me if I needed help loading my SUV.  Of course I said  "no", male pride getting the better of me.  When I went back for the next haul of mulch my wife insisted I allow those young bucks to help me.  Of course this time around there was no one to be found so the task of loading another 18 bags of mulch rested squarely on my shoulders, hamstrings, lower back and quads.  

I will say the yard is definitely coming along.  The mulch really perked up the place, much more than I thought.  Although this morning I'm moving with grace of a newborn foal, I'm glad we did what we did yesterday.  Pretty gratifying day I might say.  Definitely one of our better Saturdays.  Got in a fun hike, ran a few errands and worked our butts off in the yard.  I suppose if I were a younger, stronger man I'd make my way back over to HD today to get more mulch (we still have several spots that didn't make the cut), but I think today is going to be all about resting and enjoying another gorgeous day.  

Ok kids, out of the spa!  It's adult swim time!