ice candles

over the last couple of days we took on a decidedly low-tech--but totally nerdy--activity. anything that involves flames and ice is pretty darned cool. (literally!)

a detour in the snow

last bike commute home of 2009 (and day of the snownami), so i took a detour through the woods. it was nice to exchange the road noise for the crunch of my tires on the path and the sounds of the brittle snowflakes falling through the tree branches.

at work coffee conundrum solved

duh!

funniest webfilter violation ever

was looking at the website of one of the local churches we attend to see when they'd scheduled their Christmas eve services and it came up, at work, as a webfilter violation. what was the cause of that violation? pornography. ha! no... this site is not pornographic, but by waving this webfilter violation in front of a few of my coworkers, i might convince them to attend :-P

aerodynamics???

i got home and found i had this superawesome faring attached to the downtube of my bike. i don't think it made me go any faster, though...

flowers quietly whispering from the windowsill

the break of the day

our view out the back window this morning. yes... very, very cold.

sunrise over st. paul

not all black socks are the same

mtb ride on (maybe) the last nice day

i was able to convince b to go out on a bike ride with me. i told her i just wanted to get on my mountain bike and goof around. i took her to the reservoir woods trails in r-ville. there's not a lot of trail length there, but there's a ton of variety: open fields, pine forest, and stands of oaks.

we had fun. she's got some pretty good bike handling skills!

and, then, we goofed with some shadows

coffee + sunshine

= mmm

boo

i stepped out on the lawn tonight to snap some dark pics of our glowing pumpkins, which were pretty cool.

hiii... arrrrggg

what are you lookin at?

let there be light(ning)

a well cultured pumpkin!

then... i spotted the real star of the evening. ok, i know it's just a reflector of light and not a star, but the moon was the possible subject of the evening, and, thus, a star in my book!

if you weren't around, you might've thought it was a dark and stormy night

the clouds were moving quickly

muuuuch better

not enough grub before the workout, but this should do: cheese omlette, fried spuds, and some tabasco to warm up this gray day.

so... we're having this little art contest

at our house for the last few autumns, our youngest daughter has promoted a "spooktacular" art contest and asks each family member to submit an artistic entry that is either scary or simply fall-related. this year, i've picked digital art as my medium. i've messed with a couple of photos in gimp and am trying to decide what to submit...

monster shadow

daybreak's first victim: fire in the treetops

i'll print them both and see how they look, she says i have to submit my entry on paper.


Here's my entry from last year

cup check!

mikt thought everyone else in the office had cup envy. then stan brought in his new cup. mike was crushed.

big snow

st. paul is really taking it in the shorts weather-wise today.

capturing the neighbor's garden

the sun was streaming in the kitchen window this morning and i had a great view of the tops of some grasses in the neighbor's garden. it's a nice captured moment with the sun accentuating the texture of the grasses. without the light hitting the seed tufts, these grasses aren't usually visible.





here's a similar shot in different light. see? can't really see the grasses. the bummer is that you can't see the purple light of the sunrise that day either. oh well. it provided contrast for the moment i wanted to capture.

last haul from the garden

ah... so here's a snap of one of the last harvests from our garden. this year's crop was pretty good and we were so happy to have tomatoes for such a long stretch. if these guys ripen, they should be pretty good, but...

i don't think they'll make much of a meal :-)

really... 12 october?

this is going to be a long winter, isn't it?