Surrealistic Landscape

I’m terribly late again this week. Though I do have a somewhat legitimate excuse this time. Aside from work and the usual bits that occupy my time… I’ve gotten terribly ill the past few days. I was doing good recovering from my last bout of flu related illness, when this second wave has pretty much shut me down again.

But it can’t keep me from this blog forever. Sickness, away! I have a photo hunt to do, after all.

This week brings a subject close to my heart. Flame. I’m a bit of a pyromaniac… though possibly not quite as much as my close friend, Vicky. The lantern pictured in this shot is an old family heirloom that I inherited when my folks moved away a few years ago now. It was always something I was fascinated with as a kid, because of that whole brass “shiny” factor, and, well, it produced really gorgeous flames when the power went out. It’s one of the few things I’m glad I’ve been able to hold on to… a little happier slice of my childhood.

Be sure to check out Vicky’s very cool picture of smoldering goodness.

And Nic has joined the ranks as well! Her quite sexy photo can be found here.

I love this photo. You must all be getting tired of the household pets by now, but I couldn’t help myself when I came across this older picture. Nakita really is one of the cutest puppies. Ever. She almost makes me want to get an American Eskimo when I get my own dog finally. Though I still think I’m going to stick with my dream of having a German Shepherd.

Isn’t she cute, though? *melts*

You can find Vicky’s way cute photo here. Some day I’ll get a photo of Nakita playing with the squirrels in the yard. And my head will explode from the cuteness overload.

I’ve had this image in mind for this shot for a while, though I’m not entirely happy with how it turned out. I had forgotten what a mess the window on the east side of the house is, as its sheltered by the fenced off yard and doesn’t get very much attention. The cat pictured here is Diana, and she gets a bit neglected of late. She perches there and tries to live vicariously through the other animals in the yard. It was a bit misty this morning, as well… so it has that whole dream-like rainy day look.

This weeks’ photo hunt update was a tough one. Unfortunately I haven’t had my digital camera long enough to get some nice autumn shots of the leaves turning, so I had to dig into my archives and find something a little less recent. And, for me, autumn has always been strongly associated with Halloween.

Shawn’s little nephew is the one hamming it up in this shot. He can be a troublemaker, but he’s a good kid all in all. The jack-o-lanterns are our labor of love for Halloween 2005. On the left, you have Shawn’s mom’s jack-o-lantern, Shawn’s jack-o-lantern in the middle, and mine on the far right. All of them turned out awesome, and the picture of them glowing happily at night is incredibly cute as well.

Vicky has outdone herself this week, and you can find her picture here. It is absolutely stunning, and I wish autumn was here again already.

As most of you probably know by now, it gets cold here this time of year. And when its the middle of January and the sun makes an appearance, it’s generally something to be appreciated.

The animals in the back yard certainly do.

You’ll have to forgive the misfit cat. She’s not very photogenic. Plus I had to snap this through the glass of the back patio door, or the animals would of gone crazy for the attention. These are Shawn’s pets… well… his mother’s really but she’s seldom here at this point. The dog is an American Eskimo named Nikita. The cat was saved after a run in with a car and is appropriately named Bump. She’s the type of cat I’ll actually tolerate. She stays outside and enjoys her place out of doors.

I just love how Nikita has that glazed over, “damn this feels good” look.

Vicky’s awesome, as always, piccie can be found here. Isn’t he cute?

I know it’s way too soon to be posting another photo-hunt image, but I took this on the way to work this morning and had to share again. This has always been one of my favorite parts of winter, when the frost and snow combine just right to cover everything with that all too pretty sugar frosted covering.

It never fails to make me giggle like a little kid when I get to go outside to a white covered fairy-tale setting.

I’ve made a preemptive strike this week. Though not officially Wednesday here in the states, I thought it was somewhat unfair that my photo-hunt partner had to post everything a day before me. So here we are at week 3, with me posting a little earlier than I usually do.

Today’s shot was too pretty not to share, though.

This was taken today, just at sunset, right after one of the most beautiful snow storms I’ve had the pleasure to experience for a long time. The clouds block the sunlight a bit in this shot, as it would of been even more gorgeous to see the sunlight glance off the snow on the ground, but it was already too pretty to pass up. Imagine about an inch of snow falling not long before this photo was taken as well and you’ll have a rough idea of how magical a moment it was.

Not the best photo, but I’m quite partial to how it turned out.

This photo isn’t what I originally intended, but I’m actually quite surprised with how it turned out. What I had first thought about doing is going up to Dry Falls and taking some photos of the gorgeous cliff structures that are there. It was the first thing that popped into my head, but, unfortunately, was rather difficult to arrange a time to go photograph. The winter months and lack of daylight mean I would of had to go over the weekend, and that simply didn’t happen.

This alternate photo is something I thought up at the last moment… and even if it’s a bit from left-field, I do like how it turned out. I was going for a depth-of-field effect with the photograph, something I was able to accomplish somewhat with the macro setting on my camera, but as I can’t really fiddle with the f-stop settings on my little point and click, it’s not completely how I envisioned it.

I still think it’s a worthy addition to the collection so far, though.

Vicky’s way funky photo for this week is here. I love her photo, even if it’s one from her archives.

This week marks the first entry into a little something Vicky and I hatched up. Though actually, most of the credit goes to her, as she found the original meme and suggested we try it ourselves. Which I thought was a fantastic idea.

So… this week… childhood.

And you’re probably wondering what a couple of rocks in a yard has to do with childhood.

What you’re looking at is actually my childhood home of 18 years. It’s taken a rather significant change these past couple of years, as it’s now abandoned and neglected, but truth be told, I never liked that house much anyway. I realized not too long ago that many of my nightmares still take place in that house, even though I haven’t lived there for quite a while now.

Those rocks, though, are one of my cherished memories as a child. I would go out to those rocks at night and watch the moon and stars pass overhead, as the surface of the larger rock is just the right shape for leaning back against when you’re a little kid. There are many summer nights when I’d play by those rocks and develop a deep love for the night sky and the stars.

I find some deep symbolism in this image, as the wire fence was never there when I was a kid. That was put up by my brother when they moved back into that house a few years ago. It’s fitting, though… as I feel in many ways that I’ve tried to block out a large part of my childhood, since much of it was a lot of religious propaganda spoon fed to us as kids. You’ll notice the yard, which I can personally attest to once being quite beautiful and lush, has overgrown and gone completely neglected.

Some things simply don’t last, and sometimes that’s for the best. I’m glad those rocks are still there though. They’ll always be a part of my childhood I cherish.

You can find Vicky’s post here.