Walkabout Oldtown Albuquerque

Since the ladies were off to a shoe event at the museum I decided to play chauffeur and take a walkabout the area and take some pictures. It was a bright and cloudless day.

About 10 ish minutes from the doorstep are all the museums and old town and such and such but I can say I rarely feel like going there. Okay .. old town.. yes... but there isn't much there that is new for me right now. I wanted to walk around and see if there was something there that I might have missed. No.. but I did find a few things that either caught my eye at the moment or was something I saw before but the conditions were not good for the shot at the time. About 280 shots later and a full walk around plus a bit of wandering around the exterior of the museum and also some shots of odd statues in the area and I was done. Did stop at Blakes for a bacon Cheeseburger and onion rings ( yeah.. they hate me ) and then back around to catch a few other things....

Pick of the litter for the day....

Everywhere and anywhere... Chili's

 Deep reds and dark reds and lines and rippling shapes... I like em!

No door is safe.

 No wall secure. The cat has access to it all. One in the back on lookout.

Amazed looks

It was warm... This guy was hanging out with a friend but pretty much were staying on one place.

I sat in the square after tying to get a good shot of the church towers... almost got peed on as I was standing against a nice tree.. but the dog was nice and only sniffed my sneakers and wuffled. A good dog. I moved to the corner...then sat down. They were setting up for music but I couldn't stay long enough to listen or see anything. I did take some shots of the setup crew.. and guy and a girl. Overheard conversation was clear for everyone around on her ex boyfriends ex girlfriend saying she would do harm to herself and such. Wow. I guess everyone in the area needed to know this... I felt sorry for her anyways.

Eventful and educational.

The shoe thing looked cool too... Have to go back next weekend and check it out myself.

http://albuquerquemuseum.org/art-history/upcoming-exhibitions?/exhibition/54

Have bunches of there interesting shots to show but too pooped to pop right now.

Here is my facebook banner and logo... from the walkabout too.

Two Lights Rio Grande.

Startled.

Monday tomorrow... Monday... yay..... um.. yeah.

Saturday wipeout!

Had planned on going to a party tonight but it became apparent after visiting the mall that it wan not going to happen. Between pain and work related stuff its been bagged. Ah well.. Ill bet it was fun.

Was also supposed to to Fiesta park this morning to see the inflation and inspection of the Arkey balloon. It was too windy to deal with all those animals and that big ship. So its been pushed off to next weekend. We have also put in for a rally in Angel Fire and I hope all goes well there. Its beautiful and such a closed almost hidden valley of green I cant wait to fly about it.

So I spent the afternoon re-doing a bunch of stuff. First I swapped drives on the acrylic computers so that they windows 8.1 OS was no installed on the six core, 16 gig ram computer and I upgraded the dual core from 8 to 16 gig of ram. The ram has been sitting in a box all this time waiting for the excuse to crack the case. This was the time. After all that moving I had to rerun every damn cable including the xbox. I routed the xbox from my surface screen to the acrylic screen because I kept getting motion sickness watching it... After all that unplugging and plugging.. yeah. still get woozy watching the screen while playing a game. May have to sit back farther.

The acrylic computer came up nice and quiet but it didn't much like the swap and windows thought I was reusing the software in a second computer and had watermarked my screen. I went and reactivated it and that was a heck of a long process with nine sets of six numbers.... way fun! Now I have to get in there and update all the software... damn... and get it to the point of similarity with the other two computers. I took pictures. Still gonna be a pain in the butt.

Nice blue glow is back and running nicely. I was going to buy and install an SSD but there was no reason for the speed or the cost yet.

Xbox is up but the video quality isn't fantastic.. its okay but.. well its probably me. Sound is good and the little subwoofer is okay. I did look into a nice headset but that's... well....

Trying to find a headset is as hard as anything else.. stupid, confusing and so many mods that each one has good things and bad things and its a very big pain in the ... butt!!!  I want something that has good sound quality and is almost noise cancelling as well as wireless... lot of reasons.. I have a very ncie set of headphones but they do not cut external sounds at all and I have ear buds that are sound cancelling but are a pain to wear and they get tangled up and fall down between the chair and table all the time.... Pain in .. the........ BUTT!

Went to Johnny Rockets today.. maybe that's why my stomach feels a bit odd... I do or did like the old drug store feel of it and ran into friends... But now Id rather have passed on the hamburger.

Oh! I did even get all my camera equipment in separate little containers. DSLR stuff, GOpro stuff, cleaning stuff and connectors then cables combers and cables chargers... took a while and I threw out a massive amount of junk but its somewhat nice and sorted. I have a lot of cables to put out in the garage and I do have some bins to separate out in the other room but right now its all nice and orderly at the moment. Must think about whats next next.

My facebook banner is from last years flight from Fiesta Park with my brother. It was fun. Normally flying from the park is an up, out and land things. Not much chance to get low and have some of that kind of fun but it was in the end a good little trip with a fast deflate on landing. THe long ( selfie arm ( 8 feet )) was attached with a GoPro on the end. I love the view but the arm is a pain in the... what... butt to set up and work around. I should have put two cams in.. One doing 11megpix snaps and one doing video. THis is a video clip so the quality isn't that great.

Logo is from the same flight. Nice flames there...

Funny below...

Time to go find a snack to settle the noises below.

Short Weeks

Dont make them easy weeks.

I spent a weight of the day recabling. THe other part paperwork, and the balance chasing around in circles again. This is what happens when you can't get a straight answer from people. Not helpful.

Very frustrating.

I also worked on processing another set of windows 8. THis went a little better but all the extra software to install.. well, I just dont want to do it. Its far too boring and I am tired of reloading things over and over again. I know I have to do most of it but heck.. yawn.

It would be nice to just go fly... but that takes a lot of preparation and forethought and the last thing I am able to do right now is think or no.. really .. decide. Thinking is way easy... getting those thoughts to combine in a coherent direction is quite missing.

On windows 8.1. I really like having one login and setup for all computers I touch. Well most. I do wish all my programs would port over without me touching them. Come on Microsoft..... Cloud me baby!

Hmmm.....

Let me take my mind off that for a moment and post some shots that have not been seen yet. I will post more to facebook later but here.. Look...


Hopper in the lead.

Sometimes being first in the sky has its drawbacks... sometimes its the only way to get to the target at all. Nothing ever ( wind current wise ) stays the same for very long..unless its a strong wind.. then its going straight to the city.

Scorers waiting, watching.

 The fall of a baggie is always fun to watch. If its from very high you get a great view as it flaps away. Thrown baggies are a totally different animal.

Vasty overhead.

 A great camera lens will keep the balloons above you as well as those coming towards you in focus. Its cool how they hang there.

Sometimes you miss.

Better to try than come down with them in your hand. Good that there isnt a car or truck to steal it away as you will lose points if you don't return one.

A lot of shots still to go through and a bunch I am going to load to facebook tonight are more personal and or people Id rather they saw first. Maybe I will post them later here.. maybe not.

Choices today have been tough as I said before. I need storage space but I need access and I need usable function. I do not want clutter nor crap all over. Its a tough thing and now I will go off and do more of it.

Here is my facebook banner for the day. I had a better one but it decided to delte itself after I worked on it an hour.. damn it was good though,.

Red Rock Gallup New MExico.. Skipping along the ridges.

Street sign local.... 7 Bar.

Bye!

Trimmings

A novel day at work.. and that's enough of that....

I had to find a bit of time to think about a bunch of stuff I cant seem to think about in the office.. I got that done driving to and from a meeting.

All that thinking.. and no it was not world shaking thoughts but sorting out lines of thought to get items where they should be or ready to be run elsewhere. I didnt have my notepad so it was all stuff here and there when I got back then written down on the nice 3 x 5 yellow lined post it pad notes I love to use. I will sort it out further tomorrow but it was good.

On the way home it was thinking about where to put all the assorted pieces of camera gear and computer gear and the computer and other stuff where its not out in full view of everyone. I was this stuff tucked away but right where I can get it as soon as I need it. It cant go into the garage because the heat would beat the heck out of it.

What really frosts me is that as soon as I have a plan and maybe buy a storage trunk or thing I will decide I want to do something else.. which I really hate. I have to do something so I may just go get the little storage boxes and sort that and when I get the big storage thing I will have it in mind what exactly I am trying to get at instead of just jumping in there and buying something I didn't want or need in reality.. I hate getting old.. you always rethink things fifty to sixty times and then not do anything.

And all the while that was going on I was thinking about background wallpapers and leaves.. so I edited some leaves for tonight that I might want to use later for wide or dual monitor backgrounds....


Curvature.

Dappledcurls.

LilacStretch.

Sawtoothedpurple.

Nice base colors and maybe something an old lost friend would see but they would probably tear it out of the ground first .. hahahahaha... just kidding... These are far too basic.. well maybe the flowers would work but that's it.  I really used a 10x filter to get such diffusion. I like it. I must get more.

Something I did get done today was finish the load of windows 8.1 from windows 8 on the acrylic computer. Now the arduous task of reloading software onto it.. ugh... How bout I leave it thin as I am only going to use it for photo processing and storage control. Hmmm... I have to pop the drive out and stick it in the other acrylic computer that had the higher system hardware. I decided I didn't need the SSD yet and only overwrote the drive that was in it already. Just no reason to spend the money for that kind of speed that is going to be used for basic stuff. Another set of thoughts that went around and around for 60 cycles.

My facebook banner today was a nice shot I took last year at an invitational wine tasting at a new vineyard.. it was very nice.. and even though I do not drink wine it was nice to visit and speak with the owners. They are very nice people too. Yes.. they were also the sponsors of the last rally.. THe grapes look beautiful.

I liked this.. had to use it as my logo....

Oh so much time to get more thinking done.

Burnout

Oh the eyes are fried!

And lets talk about balloon editing overload. LOL.

I have some ideas to do with some shots but I felt I needed to add some more to facebook but in the end I decided to give it ( and my friends ) at rest for the day. All I did was load my banner and logo for the day and stop.

So what am I going to post here today without balloons...? I didn't go that far... I do have some oblique shots.. I think you might get a laugh out of.

Today I tried to contact a person on some photographs but got nothing back.. Oh well.  Perhaps tomorrow. I may send another single shot to him just to nudge him. I can only send one shot at a time as they are very huge. Back to work..... Got the notebook I was hoping to use for daily notes and found out that you really have to look at the sizes when you order this stuff.. its tiny. I could write a few things in there but it would drive me buggy. I will hand it off to someone else to use and order a normal sized notebook. This was cool because it can be imported into the computer and indexed. I need that badly. So I have hopes for the next one.

Other things are going on but its pretty boring stuff. Radios, Upgrades, checks, ram, meetings, meetings during meetings..... you know.. the standard too many things going on at once and then nothing going on for a while then more of the same.. never a normal one thing after another thing after another thing.

Posted semi non ballooning pictures for the day..... yes?

Poking along.

These very pokey things are nasty and will stick you in a moments notice. Beware!

Leaving.

 Heh! Leaving... hahahahaa.... funny. But nice transposition.

Not Sticking Around.

 Ba hahahahaha..... Nice sticks and Lindstrands in repose.

Its a punishing night.

So other funny things I ran across that are worth posting because I want to .. and also take a break today..

I need to show this to our Fire Weather Forecaster... he would laugh.

For our soccer fathers out there... and I know one and he is constantly doing "soccer" things.... 24/7.

 THis was perfect.. and the look I have while driving in this town... no all of them are stupid.. some are just as frustrated as I am... Then there is Walmart.

I squint a lot. Sometimes in the mirror.

Facebook banner and logo..... Yes.. I broke my minimal balloon day today... okay.. they are minimal.. tiny even.

THis is a baggie that appeared in the same field we had a target in. Wrong color and it had the number 52 or 54 on it which is 12 or 14 positions too high for the amount of Pilots we had flying.. so weird.

Onward and upward... or lets get some ice cream!

Light and Beauty in the eyes of the beholder.

All that looking above over the weekend reminded me that when I was resting my neck muscles I saw some of the beauty below my feet again.

Some of my favorite shots during competition is the baggie throws and how they look just before they hit the ground.. Like downturned flowers... They seem to reverse reach up, back to those who threw them.

I just loaded about ten outtakes of the team refueling and checking in Pilots.. Mostly very close and concentrated shots. Not everything and never anything. There are many I passed over because they were not flattering or they were less than nice. That is what happens when you are trying to capture a specific look but others are there also. I will never intentionally put someone on the spot. I will put up something that may seem to be odd and if I do and that person wants it gone.. it will go.

I really do not like pictures of myself so I can understand others wanting to be gone too. All good.

Below are the little things... but not all the things I saw while resting... so nice.. so delicate and so many weeds.. and a bit of trash.... Its all wonderful when pulled out and looked at from this side of the screen.. not my responsibility to pull those weeds.... yes.. do not look at my yard.. its a natural weed land. Shush! Just get out there and find that little bit of pretty.


he little things.

 Teeny tiny little pestles?

Firework Burst

 Lilac bursts in the deep greens.

Micro flowers.

 Bunched and opening.

Pinky Trashy.

More little bits of trash around and about. Basic stuff sad people throw out their windows as they blast by uncaring.

But there are so many more pretty flowers and bushes and rabbits and coyotes and more rabbits with real long ears and dogs and runners and rocks and balloonists out there.... Makes a person smile.

My facebook banner for the day is the Elks lodge that opened their doors for three days and did lots of great things...

The city or Rio Rancho Fire Rescue stood out there in the middle of the hot sun waiting for all of us to refuel and wander around.. all in heavy protective clothing. If you were my facebook friend you would be able to see them. hahaha.

Off I go to see what other trouble I can get into.

Get the bail money for us both.... okay...

Sleep Deprivation Photography

Day three of the Rio Grande Balloon Classic is done. All three days we were awake by 3 or so and out of the house around 4ish. All to take pictures and score targets and eat food and see special shapes in the sky.

Really it was fun but terribly exhausting and I was not really doing anything but taking unofficial pictures.. hahahaha....  Today's shot count is around 1367 or so. There are a lot of cyclic shots of throws on targets and other stuff. There were quite a few out of focus shots due to the fast movement of the balloons. Really fast up and down. I should have put the cam on active focus but really didn't have time and I hate giving up the ability to reframe my shot.

In the background were a GoPro and the 360 Kodak cam. The GoPro came out good but the 360 caught the antics of the balloons pogoing above us. There were also baggies raining down everywhere on the first target. It was in face dangerous to move about without looking up. I stayed in one place mostly and just let my neck ache away as the Pilots came over head. Once we saw that most of the balloons had passed we headed to target two and got a bunch of shots of more special shapes and then onto target three to see that last of the competitor s cross and then hunt for a place to land.

So many good pictures but I just tripped about 35 of them. Way too many to try and do everything tonight and I have been up since early this morning without a nap so what I am typing might be quite weird.

It was a good time and Keith and Michelle and the team did a bang up job of pulling it off.

Below are a few that I really really liked and my favorites for the day.


Eyes of the world.

 Kodak 360 and GoPro attached to a multi arm attached to a manfrotto tripod... The baggie was intentionally thrown to scare the cameras.

Jockeying

 Three Lindstrand Racers jockeying for position over a complicated target....and a tiny pibal in between.

Concentration.

 One of my favorites....down and venting to get lower.


Popping off!

 Three baggies were necessary to achieve a good score on this target... two blues in adjoining zones and one in the middle. Tough when you are trying not to hit the ground other anything else... THis was the first baggie and this Pilot had all three out and didn't look up to see where they went until after... He did good.

Approaching from the South.

 A nice approach and good throws... No space to put all of them.


Champs.

 The flames curling around overhead was pretty amazing.


Distance.

 A baggie must unfurl all the way before hitting the ground and its mostly easier to wind up before you throw for distance.

SPECIAL SHAPE!

 Getting the most out of your balloon is what is happening here. So vented and dropping so quickly that the envelope is sucking in. Since I own the same type of balloon I was able to see that even when seriously vented you can still burn up through that opening and stop.. which he did... many times.

Reaching out.

 A rule.. your feet cannot leave the basket floor.. .. even if that floor is at a 20 degree angle... A heck of a toss and a good score! His face is awesome!

Overhead and ready.

 One of our up and coming Pilots who is kicking butt with a great attitude and a serious good bunch of flying. Just prepping to throw.

Morning dew!

 Yeah.. my head is all over the place and since most of the balloons were above my neck was in lots of pain.. so when I put it down to rest it there I see some little flowers with dew on them... so ... snap.

Volcanic Mountains.

Just the suns reflection off of the clinging clouds and wonderful to see. I even used it in my fb banner for the day I liked it so much.. see...

I will be using it as wall paper too..

Logo .. another self shadow... Not a selfie thank goodness!

I have a video from the 360 processing but its taking forever to set the thumbnail. I will post a link to it tomorrow...

Peace!