Safari

In the 5 days that I was at Disneyworld a couple of weeks ago I took 529 pictures. It didn't seem like I was constantly taking pictures, although I was conscious of trying to take more than I usually do. I guess I succeeded.



My favorites are from my favorite ride.





The African safari at Animal Kingdom.









(That's a lion napping there behind the grass.)

I was looking through my pictures tonight because a friend asked me to send her this one:



I barely saw any children on leashes all week. And this was certainly the only one that was tied to something.

Best Twitpic of 2009

I have been trying to find the time to post at least one more time in 2009 (to add to the measly quantity of posts I've had all year), and since I don't have the energy to do a full-length "Best of 2009..." post, I was looking through some pictures from 2009, specifically ones I've shared on Twitter via Twitpic.



I thought I'd used Twitpic more than I did, so this was the best I could come up with. It's from our trip to Martha's Vineyard in July. This place serves the best fried clams. One order is enough to fill you up all day. We did read that it is allegedly one of Bill Clinton's favorite places to eat on the island, so we had to check it out.

A Midsummers Recap

July 25th is probably technically right smack in the middle of summer, yet somehow it feels like we are in the home stretch. It's been a fairly busy couple of months. I don't have any brilliant ideas for a post, so I think I'll borrow the bulleted list idea--from a blog I really like.


--Heading to our 2nd Phillies game of the season this afternoon. The seats for our last game were directly up from 1st base. WAY up. As in the next to the top row. At least I got a nice shot of the Philly skyline that we were right next to:


philly from 415

--Just got back from a long weekend in Portland, Maine. Highlight of the trip was spending time with my best friends, but a close second was the Wilco show on Friday night. I took a ton of pictures all weekend, with a few shots that I really really like. I was hoping for better shots from the concert, but between my lack of experience with my camera, the crowd, the dark, and the Magic Hat, I didn't get many good shots.


Conor Oberst & the Mystic Valley Band







Better shots from the next couple of days after the concert:


Display at the place we bought much lobster, one of my favorite pics. (I think it would make a great puzzle.)






Lake Harmony


--We're leaving on Monday for Martha's Vineyard for a week. The first thing anyone who has been there says when I say I'm going is "It's beautiful" followed immediately with something like "Bring a sweater!" So I have no high expectations for hot, sunny beach weather. But hopefully I will be able to continue to improve my photography skills and bring back some decent shots.

PhotoHunt: Blue

I had to go with a picture from my trip to San Diego last week, because the sky there is just SO blue. Cloudless and just endless, gorgeous blue. The ocean isn't too bad either.

Someone there told me that they have 300 perfect weather days every year. I guess that's makes it easier to handle all of the other crap they have to deal with (freeways, forest fires, earthquakes...)

PhotoHunt: Clouds

My new weekly ritual, I think, is going to be Saturday PhotoHunt. It's fun to scroll through iPhoto looking for the perfect picture for the theme. This is from Portland, Maine, October 2003. It was beautiful, but colder than I expected. I don't recall seeing the sun too much that whole trip, but I guess you don't really go to Maine in October for sun. You go for lobster.

Update 9:30pm
I found myself very aware of the clouds today, and I took this picture about an hour ago. It was sunny, but the breeze was rolling in along with the dark sky. Luckily we made it home before any rain.

A Beautiful Florida Sunset

Despite my hectic work schedule last week during my trip to Ft. Lauderdale, I did manage to find a quick minute between meetings to snap one picture.

It may not be quite as endearing as a friendly snowman picture, but as I said, I was between meetings.

I did have an interesting event on my flight down to Florida. Once we landed, we had to sit on the plane, at the gate, for almost 40 minutes. Our pilot told us all he knew was that there was something going on involving the FBI. From my window seat I was able to see several police cars with their lights on pulled up next to the plane. Next, we were told to get off of the plane, but to leave everything on the plane--coats, purses, carry-ons. If you took your cell phone with you it had to be turned off. All passengers were kept in the gate area which had been cleared for us, and which was surrounded by more police. A K9 officer and his dog came through the area about 1/2 hour later, checking every passenger individually. We watched out the window as all of the checked luggage was spread out around the plane and checked by more dogs. After another 1/2 hour, we were allowed to go back onto the plane 3 rows at a time to retrieve our personal items and then we could leave.

I made friends with one of the officers who was "guarding" us, and on my way out I asked him if he could tell me what happened. He said that they had received a call from Washington informing them that there was a bomb on our plane. Apparently it was just a false alarm.

I think after that I deserved a little time by the pool, don't you think?

3/3/08 Update: The airline just sent me a nice letter apologizing for the inconvenience, and included a $50 travel voucher. Considering that it really was something out of their control, apparently, I think it's great that they stepped up and took responsibility for it. This was my first experience on AirTran, and given this response I think I'd use them again.

Florida in February

I'm heading out to Florida today for a business trip. Florida in February is never a bad thing, but I do hate the travel part. In order to get decent direct flights, Philly was the only airport choice.

I have had awful experiences flying out of Philly, and also pleasant ones. One thing I always do is make sure I am at the airport VERY early. I think traveling is stressful enough without adding the extra stress of rushing and potentially being late. I don't mind sitting at my gate for 1 1/2 hours if I have to. In fact, the last flight I took out of Philly was on Southwest and it departed at 7:30am--I was through security and at the gate by 6:15. Plenty of time to enjoy a coffee and a soft pretzel for breakfast.