Category: photography

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May 19 – A Smiley Sunshiny Day

Today was a sunshiny day both outside and in my heart!  After church, I got to go out for lunch with Mr. Guy, The Lady, and a couple of their best friends.  We went to a place called Potbelly’s.  The name makes me laugh.  They serve delicious sandwiches there.

When we sat down to eat, all of the sudden my 100 People Project popped into my head.  A couple years ago, I decided that I was going to try to have my picture taken with 100 different people, some who I know and some who were strangers.  I haven’t taken any of these pictures since I was in Alaska last year, and I haven’t even posted those yet.  I have been a super lazy little monster.  But, The Lady always tells me to begin again where you are; so, that’s what I did today.  I am beginning where I am, with #45/100, Ms. Wendy.

Ms. Wendy is one of Mr. Guy and The Lady’s best friends.  She is part of “our village,” a group of nine friends, and this furry little blue and orange monster, who all go to church together, share a meal every Sunday, and look after each other.  Ms. Wendy is also a musician like The Lady, but Ms. Wendy blows into a silver tube to make music and The Lady blows into a black tube.  Sometimes they blow into their tubes at the same time and make pretty music together.  I was surprised that I didn’t already have a picture with Ms. Wendy, but I didn’t.  Today I fixed that and I am a happy little monster who, like my shirt says, is feelin’ awesome!

The Lady needed to take a picture “With Words” today for her picture taking group.  I offered to write her some words, but she said that we had to find already written words on a sign or something.  That could be kind of fun.

While Mr. Guy, The Lady, Ms. Wendy and Mr. Todd went to order their food, I decided to be a helpful monster and got napkins for our table.  When I put them down, I noticed that they had words on them.  The words made me laugh a little.  Then I had a great idea…I could surprise The Lady and use her cell phone and take a picture of me with the napkin and its words.  I think when you do this it is called a Cell Fee.

I see people all the time taking pictures of themselves with their cell phones.  I wonder what they do with them.  Do you have to pay for them and that is why they are called Cell Fees?  Or do the people that you give them to have to pay for them?   I could take my picture and sell it to the Lady for a fee to earn money to buy a new t-shirt…except that my picture would be on The Lady’s cell phone and she already buys my shirts for me.  What do others do with their Cell Fees?

This Cell Fee thing is hard!  First I only got half of the words, which were the important part of my picture.  Then I only got half of me.  I couldn’t figure out how to get all of the words and all of me.  I think my monster arms may be too short.  This is the best that I could do.  Maybe Cell Fees are not for me.  Mine are more like Cell Frees!  No money will be exchanged.  Despite all that, I do clean up nicely, just like the napkin says!

Mr. Guy cleans up nicely too!

When we went to fill up Mr. Guy’s cup, we found the perfect sign for The Lady’s picture for today.

The people at Potbelly like to make people smile and so do I!  This sign made me smile.  Another thing that made me smile is that The Lady took this picture instead of Mr. Guy or me trying to take another Cell Fee!

I had a lot to smile about today.  I hope that you had smiles in your day too!

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Play-ing in NYC


I bet you are wondering why I went to New York…

Offspring #2 and The Lady have a friend, Ms. Mandy, they said that she plays right in New York City and they wanted to go visit her.  That sounded fun.  I like to play.  When I asked The Lady where we were going to play  – at Ms. Mandy’s apartment? a park? a pool? a beach? – she said it was not that kind of play.  Ms. Many writes the kind of plays that you see on stage at the theater.  She is a playwright; she doesn’t play right.  Well, I bet she does play right, but that is not what was happening on this trip.  We were going to see the play From A to Double D that she wrote and Ms. Mandy was also acting in her play.  I like the theater so this plan was OK with me.

The title of Ms. Mandy’s play sounded like it was a story about the dictionary, but only a little bit of the dictionary, since it only talked about the the first three letters and part of the fourth.  I thought about it and that makes sense.  That is job security for Ms. Mandy.  At this rate, she can write six sequels to her play before she gets all the way to the letters ZZ!  I did think that it was a little strange that she stopped with “DD.”  I had to go look at the dictionary and see what words even started with two d’s.  All the words that I found were either abbreviations or acronyms.  I didn’t really understand Ms. Mandy’s thinking on this one, but she is the professional playwright so I guess she knows what she is doing.  When I asked The Lady about this, she explained that the play was not about the dictionary, it was about bras.  Bras??  The Lady explained that little (boy) blue and orange furry monsters don’t need to know or think about bras.  They are for grown-up ladies.  She showed me hers.  Boy was that a confusing contraption!!  It was even more strange than my vest!  Not only did it not have any sleeves, it didn’t have much of a front or back either.  I can see why the grown-up ladies wear these weird things under their clothes.  They are funny looking!  The Lady said that grown-up ladies wear bras to keep their breasts in place.  Breasts?  Where is Mr. Guy when I need him?  I needed a boy to explain all this girl stuff to me! 

As it turned out, I learned a lot about bras and boobs breasts and girls while watching From A to Double D.  I don’t think I understood everything, but I am pretty sure that I am glad that I only have to worry about my t-shirts and not trainers, underwires, and sports bras!  There are definite advantages to be a little blue and orange furry boy monster!  

I was happy to be at the play because The Lady, Offspring #2, and The Young Guy were very excited to be there.  Offspring #2 has been friends with Ms. Mandy for a long time, since when she was kind of a little girl and not famous, maybe since after the trainer time and before the double D time.  


And, Ms. Mandy was happy that they were there.  We had breakfast with her the next day.  She  agreed to have her picture taken with me!  Maybe some day we will both be really famous!

During the day before Ms. Mandy’s play, The Young Guy, Offspring #2, and I walked around New York City.  Well…they all walked and The Lady carried me.  Mr. Guy does a little better carrying me. The Lady didn’t do so well trying to hold me and her camera.  She didn’t take very many pictures on this trip.

The first place that we walked was to the World Trade Center and 9/11 Memorial.  Offspring #2 and The Lady explained that sixteen years ago, two buildings called the twin towers, were hit by airplanes that had been taken over by people who did not like our country.  Lots and lots of people died and lots were hurt.  I was not born when this happened and Offspring #2 was only eight years old.  The Lady remembered it very well.  There is a memorial where these two towers stood.  It is a fountain and a reflecting pool with the names of all those who lost their lives on that day.


There were so many names on the memorial.  So many people died.  This made me very sad.


A new building has been built in the area.


It is called Freedom Tower and is the tallest building in the western hemisphere.


It hurts my heart to think about that day in 2001.  I wasn’t even alive back then and seeing this memorial sends chills down my furry spine.  I can’t even imagine what it must have been like for all the people who were right here in New York City or even those, like The Lady, Offspring #2, and Mr. Guy, who watched it all on television.  The people who’s names I read on the memorial here and their families now have a place in my heart forever.

After we visited the 9/11 Memorial we walked some more and then decided to take the subway.  I have ridden the trains in Dallas, where I live, but they are above the ground.  In New York the trains go under the ground through tunnels.  The Lady told be that that is why they are called subways, because sub means below.  I should have figured that out by myself.

We bought our tickets and then walked through this gate that looked like we were going into a sideways jail.

The good thing was that the bars kept moving so it didn’t feel like we were in jail!

Once we were inside the not-jail, I saw the tracks and watched for the train we needed.  Offspring #2 told me which one to look for.


We got on…rode for a few minutes in the dark…got off and walked up some stairs…and we were right where we wanted to be.  It sort of felt like magic.  I guess the same thing happens on the airplane, but since it is usually not dark in the sky when we fly, it doesn’t feel so much like magic.


I wish we had more pictures from our trip. I thought that Offspring #2 and The Lady might be taking lots of pictures with their phones because they were in their hands all the time.  When I asked to see their pictures they said that there weren’t many.  I was confused until they told me that they were using their phones so that we knew where to go.  The phones had a map on them and gave them walking directions.  I wondered how they always seemed to know where they were going!

We weren’t in New York very long.  I wish we could have seen a little bit more of the city, but I was also glad to come home because I missed Mr. Guy.  Hopefully Ms. Mandy will do another play right and we will get to go see her and one of her plays again!


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A Month of Me: Day 24 – Milk, Mugs, and Memories Shared


Today Mr. Guy told me all about his dad, mostly about how he worked for the Missouri Pacific Railroad as a claims attorney.  Mr. Guy explained that whenever there was wreck center that involved a train, his dad would go investigate how it happened.  When Mr. Guy was a little boy he rode the trains with his dad…not the wrecked trains, the good trains.  When he was on the train, he drank his milk out of a little glass milk bottle and his dad used the coffee mug.  Now Mr. Guy uses the coffee mug and I get to drink my milk out of the same glass milk bottle that he used when he was a little monster boy.

I liked learning about Mr. Guy’s dad and I like that The Lady took a picture of us with the railroad mug and bottle, but I don’t like her picture AT ALL!  She made me a little furry gray and grayer monster, not the little furry blue and orange monster that I am.  Monsters who were born gray should be gray in their pictures.  Monsters who were born blue and orange should always be blue and orange in their pictures!  Mr. Guy said that his fur used to be brown but turned gray when he grew up so he looks OK in The Lady’s picture.  If my fur turns gray when I grow up, then pictures of me can be gray and grayer.  Right now, I want them to be blue and orange!

The Lady told me that she made the picture gray and grayer because Mr. Guy and I were too colorful.  With my blue and orange fur and his green plaid shirt, the red train logos were barely noticeable and they are the most important part of the picture.  I guess I understand that, but I don’t like it.  I hope this is the last gray picture that The Lady wants to take of me…until my fur is gray like Mr. Guy’s.

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A Month of Me: Day 22 – Out of Touch

After our busy weekend, we just stayed home yesterday.  The Lady gave me her iPad so that I could look at all of the pictures that she and the other picture taking people took.  It was interesting to see how everyone saw things a little differently.  Maybe some day I can have my own picture taking machine.  I’m sure I would see things in my own unique way, in a way that only a furry little blue and orange monster can see!  My b-day (Brought Home Day) is coming up soon.  Maybe I might get one as a present!

The Lady’s iPad is a hard thing for a little monster to use.  It has this thing called a touch screen.  That is how you are supposed to make the iPad do things.  Well, apparently the way humans touch and monsters touch is not the same.  The Lady would tap on it and it would do exactly what she wanted it to do.  I would touch it with my claws and it would do crazy things.  It acted like I was tickling it rather than just touching it.  The whole experience was crazy making for this little monster!

Somehow in all of the button pushing, I managed to take a picture of me.  The Lady thought that I was intentionally trying to take a selfie.  Nope!  It was an accident!

Maybe I was still just too tired to deal with this technology stuff.  I wonder if a picture taking machine is easier to use than The Lady’s iPad.

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Day 21: My 100 People Project #30-33!

After sleeping in a little on Sunday morning, we got up and had breakfast with the picture taking people who were staying at our hotel.  I was sad to have to say good-bye to them already, but they were already talking about someplace where they will meet again to take more pictures.  That made for happier good-byes.


After we finished eating. but before everyone left the hotel, I remembered that I hadn’t taken any photos for my 100 People Project during the weekend.  When I among all the fun people, I forget that I should be taking pictures of them.  Maybe I picked the wrong kind of project for myself.  Anyway, I did take a couple this morning.

Ms. Peggy was one of the first of The Lady’s picture taking friends that I ever met.  She lives in Delaware.  When The Captain was sick, Ms. Peggy and another picture taking friend, Ms. Michele, came to visit The Lady so she had some friends to do fun things with while she was taking care of The Captain.  Ms. Peggy brought two of her friends, Ms. Karen and Ms. Wendy, with her to Leesburg for the weekend.  Ms. Karen and Ms. Wendy live in Lewes, DE, the same town where The Captain lived and where Mr. Guy and The Lady adopted me!  It is a small world!

We haven’t been back to Delaware now that The Captain is gone and The Lady sold his house, but since we now have lots of new friends in Lewes, maybe we will go back and visit sometime soon.  I think that I would like that.  I could go back to Kids’ Ketch, the store on Second Street in Lewes where Mr. Guy and The Lady found me, and tell them how happy I am to have been adopted by Mr. Guy and The Lady even though I had to move from Delaware to Texas.

Even though I met Ms. Peggy a few years ago, I did not have a good picture with her because I had not started my 100 People Project back then.  She and her friends agreed to help me!  I like taking pictures with people who are friends.  And, I got three new numbers in one picture!


I am thankful that these pretty ladies were willing to have their picture taken with a little shaggy blue and orange monster!  

After we said good-bye to the Delaware Ladies, we had to go pack our suitcase and get ready to head to the airport.  On our way back in to the hotel, The Lady stopped at the front desk to make a reservation for the hotel shuttle to take us.  The man behind the desk was very cheerful and helpful.  He made our reservation and he told Mr. Guy where he could get more coffee.  Since this man was so nice, and I was on a roll with my project, I asked him if he would have his picture taken with me.  He said, Yes!  Thank you, Mr. Eric!


We were staying at the Courtyard by Marriott at Dulles Town Center.  If you ever go to Leesburg, or Dull as Dulles, or Sterling Virginia, you should go see Mr. Eric at his hotel.

I did have one concern about Mr. Eric’s hotel though…they had some crazy art in the hallway!

I like the colors in this painting, but it made me feel like I was in the middle of a Texas tornado.  Well…I’ve never really been in the middle of a Texas tornado, but if I ever am, I think it would feel the way this painting looks – twirly and dizzy-making!  I wonder if the inside of a tornado would be blue and orange?

After we packed our bags, we loaded into the shuttle and were on our way back to the airport.  We had a couple hours to wait for our plane so Mr. Guy went to get us something to drink.  For a minute I was confused about this place, Five Mr. Guys…there aren’t five Mr. Guy’s; there is on one real Mr. Guy!  Then I read more closely. It is just Five Guys, not Five Mr. Guys.  I felt much better!


We had an uneventful airplane ride home.  I slept the whole way.  I didn’t even wake up to eat any nuts.  When we got home the canines and the felines were glad to see us.  I wanted to catch up on my blog as soon as we got home, but I was still a tired little monster.  Having fun is hard work!

Thank you again to all of the picture taking people who made me feel a part of the group and to Ms. Peggy, Ms. Karen, Ms. Wendy, and Mr. Eric for agreeing to be part of my project.

I am a happy and grateful little blue and orange furry monster!

Monster hugs to everyone!

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A Month of Me: Day 20 – Lens Friends Photowalk

I just went to bed, rolled over once, and then it was time to get up again.  My fur didn’t even have a chance to get messy.  That’s a good thing.  I didn’t have to use that brush thing that The Lady made me bring along.  The only good thing about having to be up and dressed before 6am is that The Lady and Mr. Guy had a surprise for me.  They ordered one of the cool t-shirts that we brought for the picture taking people for me!  It was a special monster-sized one and it was orange!  The Lady’s was pink, but Mr. Guy and I, well all of the guys, got orange ones!  How perfect is that?!  It made me feel like part of the group even though I didn’t have one of those picture taking things around my neck.

 Just like the picture of Mr. Guy and me at the falls, we look alike here, too!  And its not just because of the orange shirts.  It must be our handsomeness!

We went to Meadowlark Gardens at 6:30 in the morning.  The picture taking people wanted to take pictures of flowers and other stuff that grows outside.  All the bright colors of the flowers woke me up.  Mr. Guy did not have enough coffee before we left the hotel so I’m not sure that he was completely awake.

I did not see any blue flowers on our walk through the garden, but I did see these pretty purple ones that looked like a great big ball.


They are called alliums.  I told Mr. Guy and The Lady that we need to grow some of these in our garden at home.

Then I saw pretty orange flowers.  The remind me of my horns.  I’m not sure what these are called.


It think it may be something like echo rojo.   Maybe this is why The Lady was using Spanish, sort of, yesterday!  Echo rojo means red hot poker, I think.

The gardens also had a jangseung.  Jangseung is a Korean word meaning a totem.  In Korean villages, these poles were placed at the edges of villages to scare off demons.


If Mr. Guy was wearing his fancy black hat, he would look sort of like the man on the jangseung.  Mr. Guy only looks frightening enough to scare off demons before he has had his coffee in the morning!


Saturday was a special day at the garden.  They were celebrating the 5th anniversary of the Korean Bell Garden so there were speakers, and microphones, and a podium set up for the people who were going to talk.  We did not stay at Meadowlark Gardens long enough to hear the presentation.  I did take a minute to see what it would feel like to stand at the podium and pretend like I was talking to a whole crowd of people.  Maybe someday, I will become a politician.  If I do, I will be an honest one who does good things for all people…and monsters, even the monsters who have different colors of fur than I do.

We were all hungry when we left the gardens.  We headed to downtown Leesburg, Virginia, which is where the picture taking people were going to spend a big part of their day.  Though before they started taking pictures, we got some doughnuts!


 Mr. Guy picked me up so that I could see all of the different kinds.  Yummy!

And then it was time to walk around the town.  There was so much to look at.


The Lady took lots of pictures in downtown Leesburg, but I was not in very many of them.  I do like this one she took of Ms. Sherri as a photobomber!  Ms. Sherri is one of the first of The Lady’s picture taking friends that I ever met.



Some of the other picture taking people took photos of me.  Maybe they will share them with Mr. Guy and The Lady.

 Mr. Guy carried me around all day and pointed out things that he thought might interest me.


We went to a cemetery and looked at headstones.  Mr. Guy explained that these are markers that show where people who have died are buried.  We looked at the names of the people and their birth and death dates.  Some of them lived and died over two hundred years ago!  Though I didn’t know any of the people who were buried here, it made me happy to think about them and say a prayer for them and let them know that they are not forgotten.

After we had walked around Leesburg a little more, we were tired and getting hungry again. 


Once all of the picture taking people were also tired and hungry, we went to lunch.  

After lunch we went to this place where there were lots of tents and lots of people.  Some of the people were selling weird stuff like old furniture and car parts and signs.  Mr. Guy said it was called a flea market.  I’m glad that we were already there before he told me what it was called.  I sure wouldn’t want to think that we were going to go someplace where all you can do is buy and sell fleas!  I don’t even want to go someplace where they give you fleas for free!  Fleas would be a disaster in my fur.  And I wouldn’t want to share them with the canines and feline when I got home.


Again, after spending the afternoon wandering around and looking at all of the unusual stuff at the market, we were hungry again.  Ms. Kay, one of the picture taking people invited all of us to her house for dinner.  We had pizza and salad and wings and a fancy cake with ice cream on top.  

And, she took a picture of all of the picture taking people and all of their friends and significant others.  They let me be in the picture too!  I think I kind of hid Mr. Guy.  Oops!


It made me a very happy little blue and orange furry monster that everyone was so nice to me.  I thought they might think that I was too silly to come along on their photowalk.  Nope!  They made me feel like one of them…but with just a shirt and no picture taking machine. 

By the time we got back to our hotel.  I was very, very sleepy.  This was a long, but super fun, day for this little monster.


And in the morning, we planned to meet our friends for breakfast at 8:00, before everyone was ready to head home.  After getting up at 4:30 on Friday and 5:30 on Saturday, 7:15 on Sunday felt like sleeping in!

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A Month of Me: Day 19 – In the Air Again

Friday seems like a long time ago now!  I could not post from The Lady’s iPad while we were gone to Virginia so I had to try and remember for three days everything that I wanted to write!  That is hard for a little monster with limited storage space!

We got up early, but not too early, to go to the airport.  The Lady told me that we were flying to a new place in Virginia called Dull as.  

Dull as…?  Dull as what, I asked.  

The Lady looked confused.  What do you mean dull as what?, she asked.

She said we were going someplace dull as…  Maybe this was some kind of game and I was supposed to fill in the blank, kind of like a Knock-Knock joke.  Dull as ice cream with no chocolate sauce?  Dull as a story with no pictures?  Dull as blue without orange?  

She said, “No!  No!!  No!!!  Dull is!

Oh!   Dull is…  Dull is a pencil with no lead.  Dull is people who take themselves too seriously.  Dull is watching golf on TV.

“Dull es…D-U-L-L-E-S,” she said in a rather frustrated way.  

Why are we using Spanish verbs?, I asked.  Is, es…what’s the deal?

Sometimes The Lady loses her patience with me when it comes to conversations like this.  When that happens, she sends me to Mr. Guy to straighten me out.  He told me that Dulles is one word, not two,  and it is the name of a place.  Finally it all made sense.  I was happy to hear that we were not going to a dull as or dull is kind of place!

We had a nice uneventful flight, nothing like our last flight to Virginia!

When we landed at DULLES, we went to our hotel.  We had a few hours before we were supposed to meet the picture taking people.  Mr. Guy and I continued the nap that we had started on the plane and The Lady did some work.

Then it was time to go on our first adventure.  We met just a few of the picture taking people and went to Great Falls Park.  I didn’t know there was such a thing as great falls.  I always thought falls were bad things because when people and monsters fall, they break bones, and scrape elbows, and get stitches.  Mr. Guy explained that falls is also a word that describes water flowing over a precipice.  I had no idea what he was saying, but I did get that we were talking about water and not people or monsters so I figured it would be OK.


The falls looked pretty and I liked the sound of the water.

Mr. Guy and I sat and listened while The Lady took pictures.


Except for the no hair and blue fur part, we kind of look a like, don’t you think?  Oh, and Mr. Guy hides his horns a little better than I do.

It was very hot while we were watching the water fall.  And then it started to rain.  We did what everyone does in less than ideal circumstances; we went to Starbucks.  Then we went to dinner with a few more of the picture taking people.  And finally we went back to the hotel and went to bed because the picture taking people wanted to start taking pictures at 6:30 in the morning!  I was going to have to be awake and dressed very early for a second day in a row!  I wasn’t sure that this was a good thing.

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A Month of Me: Day 18 – Boxes, Bags, and Suitcases

Today was a busy day t my house.  I just found out that we are going on a trip tomorrow!  We are going to Virginia to see The Lady’s picture raking friends.  This will be our third trip to see them and every time that we go we fly to a different place.  I will get to see lots of different parts of the state of Virginia if this keeps up.  The Lady also said that I will get to meet some new friends on this trip.  I am an excited furry little blue and orange monster!

This afternoon I had to find some shirts for the trip and find my monster hairbrush.  I don’t really use the brush much, but The Lady always makes me take it when we travel so that I don’t look like a shaggy monster.  I like looking like a shaggy monster!  I put my things in the suitcase.  Now I am all ready to go.

One thing is different about this trip.  The Lady got t-shirts for all of the picture taking people and their friends who aren’t picture takers but hang out with the picture takers, like Mr. Guy and Mr. Ray.  I helped The Lady put everyone’s shirt in a bag with their name on it so that when we get off of the airplane tomorrow, we can give everyone a shirt.  T-shirts are the best!  Maybe The Lady will let me push some buttons on her camera and maybe I can take a picture of all of the picture taking people not taking pictures!  Instead they could all be in the picture.

We have to get up very early tomorrow so I suppose I should go to bed so that I am well rested for our super fun weekend!

Tomorrow I will be writing from Virginia!

Good night, everyone.

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A Month of Me: Day 16 – T-Shirts

 

I learned something about The Lady today.  She likes t-shirts just like me!  Now that she doesn’t have to go to school everyday, she is wearing her t-shirts instead of her teacher clothes.  Mr. Guy wears t-shirts a lot too since he is retired and doesn’t have to go to school anymore.
I get a new t-shirt every time I visit someplace new.  I also have some that have been given to me by my friends.  And, I have a few that are for special days.  I don’t have one like The Lady’s, though.  Hers has her shopping list on it.  Coffee and cameras.  She and Mr. Guy always have coffee on their shopping list.  They drink A Lot of coffee!  The Lady putt cameras on the list because she really likes to take pictures.  
Today, The Lady was in the picture with me instead of taking the picture of just me.  I don’t think we have many pictures of the two of us together..  Usually Mr. Guy is in pictures with me.  The Lady likes it best that way.  She says that Mr. Guy and I are quite handsome and make her pictures look nice.  
I like seeing The Lady in pictures, but we need to find her a t-shirt with something other than a shopping list on it!