EMPS: Chasing Santa in Tucson Traffic

For Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #67: People And Places, Carly wanted us to get out and photograph people in, you know, places. Exactly a week ago as I write this, on Sunday afternoon, I had an unexpected encounter with some rather famous people in the most ordinary of places: the intersection of 22nd St. and Craycroft Road here in Tucson, Arizona, less than two miles from my home.



I was on my way across town when I saw a flash of the color red on a motorcycle in the right lane ahead of me.



When I pulled up to get a better look, the garments were instantly recognizable. The couple on the motorcycle were two of the most celebrated people in the world, particularly at this time of year: Santa and Mrs. Claus!



It soon became clear that they were turning right onto Craycroft, headed, perhaps, for Toys R Us, or possibly Party City. (Make of that what you will.) Well, I had to follow them, didn't I? I soon caught up and pulled alongside. Santa looked a little dubious at my maneuver, but his wife graciously waved as I took the shot, while Here Comes Santa Claus blared from the Harley's speakers.



And that's not all! The Clauses had an escort. Two elves were riding with them on a second motorcycle. I think they were a couple as well. And there you have it: the daring Daylight Ride of the Santa Claus Gang!

Karen

Weekend Assignment: #297: DIY

This week's Weekend Assignment sis inspired by my husband's current project:

Weekend Assignment: #297: There are times when we hire professionals to build or fix things for us, and other times when we attempt the job ourselves. Some people pride themselves on their DIY skills or electronics geekery, while others leave it to the experts as much as possible. How about you? Is your first instinct to call for help, or do it yourself?

Extra Credit: Have you ever regretted taking on a task best left to the professionals?

At this moment, John's Mac is lying open on the desk in his office, having become basically unusable about a month ago. A week ago the replacement hard drive he bought on eBay arrived in the mail, and last night I held the monitor in place while he extracted the old, broken drive. Tonight we checked three stores for the rubber cement the Internet says he needs to attach something to something else. Slowly but surely, he's moving toward the scary moment when his decision to try to fix the Mac himself is a brilliant success or a dismal failure.

Now if it were me, I'd have had a tech looking at the thing a month ago. Opening up a computer is not my idea of a good time. Neither is replacing the flapper on a toilet, patching cement in the back yard, or replacing a washer on a sink. Fortunately, John is well up to the latter three tasks - well, sort of. When he does admit that expert help is needed - a plumber for a pipe in the back yard, for example, or aqnd electrician when a circuit breaker dies - I'm the one who has to make the call. I'm not sure what that proves, if anything.

But there are times when I stubbornly take on a project at the very limit of my abilities. For Halloween 2007 I made a Tiki mask out of cardboard. It came out okay, but I pulled an all-nighter to do it. Another time I attempted to spray paint the inside of my Saturn, replacing the rather ugly brown dash with pink. It really, really, didn't work, and John was furious. The biggest issue was that it caused a terrible reflective glare on the windshield. We went to the Tanque Verde Swap Meet and bought an upholstered cover for the dash, and it ameliorated the problem. Sort of.

How about you? Do you spend the weekend rebuilding your computer or installing new cabinets, or would you rather leave it to the experts? While you're thinking about that, let's have a look at last week's responses.

For Weekend Assignment: #296: Scandalized, I asked how much you follow or avoid news of celebrity and other scandals. Click on the names below to read the full responses:

Duane said...

You can usually catch me on my soapbox, railing about how the media is wasting so much time on such nonsense while there are much more important stories going on. For example, in the past few days, while the media has devoted major resources in tracking down every single one of Tiger's mistresses, the escalation of the Afghanistan War, the health care battle in the Senate, the upcoming climate conference in Copenhagen, and other major stories haven't received the attention they deserve.

Carly said...

I suppose my particular interest in such stories would fall into the "In between" category. I don't think I obsess, but there are some types of scandals that capture my attention more then others do. I tend to follow the political scandals much closer then... say... the latest he said/she said with John and Kate Gosselin. Although I have to admit, there is something about the Gosselin's that intrigues me on some level.

Florinda said...

In this time of 24-hour news cycles and information overload, it's awfully hard to avoid hearing about the scandal du jour (and it seems like every jour there's a new scandal), but after the first few reports, I usually try to. I'm interested in the first few reports, but once the stories move beyond "just the facts" and start digging for overly-intimate details and speculating at random, I tend to start feeling like I really don't need to know much more about it after all.

Julie said...

I click and read some stories but honestly, unless a celebrity does something beyond the pale I'm not terribly interested. If I follow, it's mainly out of interest to see how the various outlets cover a particular story. Boring, I know.

Thanks, folks! I'm writing this on the night of Tucson's first hard freeze of the year, with snow on the mountains predicted for early next week. Your entries are giving me all sorts of ideas on how to warm up!

Here are the guidelines if you'd like to participate in the Weekend Assignment:

1. Please post your entry no later than Friday, December 19th at 6 PM. (You can also post your response in the comments thread, but a blog entry is better. )
2. Please mention the Weekend Assignment in your blog post, and include a link back to this entry.
3. Please come back here after you've posted, and leave a link to your entry in the comments below.
4. Visiting other participants' entries is strongly encouraged!
5. I'm always looking for topic ideas. Please email me at mavarin2 on gmail.com if there's a Weekend Assignment theme you'd like to see. If I use your idea, you will be credited as that week's "guest professor."

I hope to hear from you soon!

Karen

Who Is That?

A million down, 18,841 to go.

I'm working on a kind of fun but very time consuming project at home, a consequence of changing computers a few weeks ago. I had to download Picasa 3 again, and start over nearly from scratch on the program's primary function: cataloging every image file on every hard drive it can find, as well as on your Picasa web albums.

The most interesting but troublesome Picasa 3 does, if you let it and help it along, is catalog and tag every face it can find in all those photos, coordinating these identifications with your Picasa web albums (where Blogger images are stored) and even your Google contacts list. Did I mention this is a Google product? Anyway, it seems to me a worthwhile thing to do, because it automates the tagging process quite a bit, making it easier to find pictures of specific people. It also can be a memory jogger. You may know now who that co-worker is that you snapped at the Christmas party in 2005, but will you remember his name five years and three jobs later? How about the actor who played the albino guy in that one episode of Doctor Who? Or the kids in your second grade class photo? If you track the answer down now, that face is identified forever.

Do I know you?

The program sorts all the people into albums as it goes, a process that can take days if you have (as I do) multiple copies stored on various drives of practically every digital photo you've ever taken. It's fun and kind of amazing to see the variety of faces in the unidentified group, the actor from desktop wallpaper or that DVD I photographed surrounded by people I vaguely recognize from church, or else don't remember photographing at all.

But I've never met any of these people!

Some are vague blurs or too dark to bother with (half of these are unedited files), but most of the faces look like interesting people having a good time, judging from all those smiles. Doubleclick on a stranger and she might turn out to be a face in a crowd at Disneyland, or a kid in the same first communion ceremony as my godson. More disquieting are the faces I know but can't recall the names instantly, whether they starred in Harry Potter movies or were in some of my classes from first grade through high school.

Also potentially troubling are the sheer numbers of files it finds of each photographic subject, including many copies of the same basic image due to unedited files, backups and pictures of pictures. I somehow have more photos of myself (838) than anyone else. #2, I believe, is David Tennant, with 502 images and counting. My beloved husband, who doesn't like me to post his photo, has 159 images. But I have more pictures of Barbie's sister Skipper (94) than of my brother Steve (20). To be fair, though, I see Skipper far more often. There are several Skippers in our den, and Steve has only been to Arizona once.

In some ways the software is very smart about this facial recognition stuff. Somehow it usually gets Ringo Starr and Leonard Nimoy right in photos taken years or even decades apart. Other times, though, it can be completely idiotic, misinterpreting a railing or a pattern of dots as a face. Jolly Rogers, troll dolls, the picture on the mouse pad in the picture of your office, the actor on the spine of the video box on the shelf behind your husband...all these and more are fair game to Picasa. "Who is this person?" it wants to know. "Add a name." Sometimes it makes a wild guess, and the results can be hilarious. Some examples I've found:

"
Also David Tennant and a guy from church!

• David Tennant, a black guy with dreads and at least one woman identified as my bald, white, male character Fayubi
• My male high school social studies teacher as my Aunt Flora
• Reverend Seth Polley as Wendy Darling (Peter Pan's friend, as seen on the dark ride)
• Emmet Smith (from a magazine cover) as Mattel's Barbie.

There were even odder examples, confusing me, David Tennant, Barack Obama and others with each other; but I don't quite remember the specifics. There were a lot of them.

I'm well on my way though the project now; the scanning is finished and I only have 18,458 unnamed people left. Yes, the number went up since I wrote the opening paragraph of this entry, due to finding several blurry strangers identified as Scott Bakula or a Mavarin drawing. But I'm getting there.

Next time: the Weekend Assignment!

Karen

EMPS: The New, Improved Old Car

To be honest, I kept putting off taking the pictures for this week's Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #66: Under The Hood. The hood doesn't stay up on my Eagle Vision, and it's hard to find and operate the catch that opens the hood at all. But here are the pics at last.



The thing to notice here is that these pics no linger feature ashes from burned wiring, as they did when I last photographed what was under the hood of my car. Also, the radiator has a shiny new cap. The radiator cap, at $8 or $12, I forget which, was the least expensive by far of the four sets of repairs the Eagle got this summer and fall. I figure we spent about $2000 repairing this 1994 car, much of which we still owe my dad, who pitched in to help.

The same car last August, after it overheated. Note the burned wiring.

So the engine, radiator, and air conditioning are in pretty good shape, finally. But the paint job is dead, the driver's side inside door handle fell off months ago, and the plastic dashboard is warping in the Arizona heat. But the car still gets me around, and that's what counts. Right?

Karen

Weekend Assignment: #296: Scandalized

This week's Weekend Assignment seemed like a good idea at the time:

Weekend Assignment: #296: The press and the public always seem to be obsessed with one scandal or another, from Tiger Woods to Balloon Boy. Do you eagerly follow such stories, try to avoid them, or something in between? Does the identity of the celebrity (or would-be celebrity) affect how interested you are?

Extra Credit: Have you ever purchased a supermarket tabloid?

This week, Tiger Woods has been the subject of much news and speculation in the aftermath of a rather minor traffic accident, along with derisive jokes and even CGI recreations of the incident. And I don't care. I'm only vaguely aware of how the story unfolded, and I really don't need to know whether his wife hit him with a golf club and to what degree he deserved it. Much as I disapprove of adultery, I have no interest in  learning about the alleged sexual misbehavior of someone I've never met. What business is it of anybody's, aside from the people directly involved?

The story of the boy and the runaway balloon was slightly different. It wasn't about sex or celebrities. It was initially a bit of an oddball mystery to be solved, namely, what is this balloon thing, and why did they think there was a boy attached to it when there wasn't? My interest lasted only until the mystery was solved and the hoax revealed.

Michael Jackson? I admit that I watched one or two specials in the media frenzy after his death, if there was nothing better on. The only excuse I can offer is that I grew up hearing the guy on the radio, and was slightly intrigued by his tragic persona. Many years ago I postulated that he would benefit from being forced to live a normal life for a while, specifically working at a fast food counter. I still think so, l really. But no, I don't think his life and death warranted wall-to-wall coverage for weeks on end.

All this being the case, it's probably no surprise that I hate supermarket tabloids, and have never purchased one. I don't trust them to be remotely accurate, an assumption that seems to be borne out if one compares the headlines from week to week. For a while it seemed that one of these papers named a different culprit every issue in the death of  the same little girl. Now a certain paper seems to be making up a scandal involving a Republican one week, a Democrat the next, over and over and on and on. It seems to me there's enough legitimate scandal involving Senators and governors. Do we really need to supplement them with fake scandals about the current and former Presidents and their families?

Reading the paragraph above this one, you might wonder: if Karen hates tabloids so much, then how does she know in such detail what they have claimed in their headlines? Okay, you got me: I do tend to read one or two headlines as I wait to pay for my groceries. To paraphrase a line from one of my unsold novels, it's only because I have no better use for my eyes. I don't read the articles, nor buy the publication. I just stand there, being annoyed.

How about you? Do you enjoy following celebrity news, particularly stories of famous people making a mess of their lives? When non-celebrities get their fifteen minutes of fame, do you notice? Or is it all just background noise to you? Tell us about it in your blog, or in the comments below. Easy instructions to participate are at the end of this entry, right after last week's wrap-up.

For Weekend Assignment #295: Keep Me Warm!, I asked how you like to keep warm in cold weather. Click on the names below to read their full responses:

Bea said in comments...

Hi Karen. I'd rather keep the thermostat at lower than 70, possibly 68 would be enough for me. But hubby likes to keep warm, and donning more clothes isn't exactly his solution. We have disagreements about how to respond to the colder evenings every winter. I love snuggling in warm blankets. Alas, two puppies on the bed would be completely acceptable by me, but our babies are gone, and we haven't opened our home to new pets just yet. Perhaps when one of us can be home most of the day, we'll reconsider. Retirement perhaps, in two years. Til then, I settle for wrapping up in a blanket when I'm sitting at the computer in the winter. Or reading a good book. Take care. bea

Florinda said...

Right now, the thermostat is set at 73, but the heat's not turned on. I'll switch it on and lower it to 69 overnight, and then bring it up to 73 again in the morning, when we crawl out of our warm beds and into showers that don't warm up fast enough. But on a typical day, I'll turn the heat off again before we leave the house. This is Southern California; the number of days each year when we actually have to heat the house all day long is probably in the low double digits.

Julie said...

Last night a cold rain fell, and I was simply cold and miserable. About 7:30 last night I gave up and settled in bed under the electric blanket with a book. My arms were chilly, but that was the price I paid to keep the rest of my body warm.

Carly (of Florida) said...

Here is my favorite way to keep warm, cuddle with the hubby under our 2 down comforters and a thermal blanket. My parents were visiting last week and on the same night we slept under our 2 comforters (no thermal blanket that night.) They pushed the quilt off of the bed they were sleeping in and used only a sheet.

Carly (of California) said...

Dylan is my little cuddle buddy when it's time for bed, he just loves to sleep alongside me, between myself and Alan. When I sleep alone, on Sunday nights, he sleeps on a pillow right next to me, and sometimes, he cuddles on my right shoulder. Not only is it heartwarming, but it is body warming as well. He takes care of me, and I always feel loved. 

Mike said...

When it is chilly, I usually put on what Jenn likes to call my 'old man sweater.' It's just a zip up fleece thing, but since I wear it all the time, Jenn likes to make fun of me. Though, when I am on a stretch of days off I do tend to wear it a lot. It's like the flannel shirt Michale Keaton wore in Mr. Mom. So maybe she's not so far off. Hey, at least it's not a sweater that Mr. Rogers wore, or anything.

Thanks, folks! I'm writing this on the night of Tucson's first hard freeze of the year, with snow on the mountains predicted for early next week. Your entries are giving me all sorts of ideas on how to warm up!

Here are the guidelines if you'd like to participate in the Weekend Assignment:

1. Please post your entry no later than Friday, December 12th at 6 PM. (You can also post your response in the comments thread, but a blog entry is better. )
2. Please mention the Weekend Assignment in your blog post, and include a link back to this entry.
3. Please come back here after you've posted, and leave a link to your entry in the comments below.
4. Visiting other participants' entries is strongly encouraged!
5. I'm always looking for topic ideas. Please email me at mavarin2 on gmail.com if there's a Weekend Assignment theme you'd like to see. If I use your idea, you will be credited as that week's "guest professor."


Stay warm, everyone!

Karen

More Power!

This entry won't be especially deep or wordy. It's just to show you something I've been tracking for a few months now.

The last "Safeway Sunset"? Maybe.

At the corner of Golf Links and Wilmot in Tucson is a formerly empty lot. Looking west across it from the Safeway shopping center, one sees the Tucson Mountains in the distance. When the lot was empty, it was a fabulous setting for sunset photos. Over the years I've taken many a "Safeway Sunset" picture from the parking lot in front of Subway.

I think that I shall never see
base housing lovely as a tree.

A year or two ago that began to change, as base housing for Davis-Monthan Air Force Base was built at the south end of the empty lot. The view was suddenly more prosaic, but if I pointed the camera in the right direction at the right time I could still get something good.

Then something new happened. First a bunch of short posts went up, hardly taller than old-fashioned headstones. These spread across the land on the south side of Golf Links, from Wilmot nearly to Craycroft Rd a mile away. As the mysterious construction continued, I discussed this odd sight with someone from the temp job I had at the time. He also lives in the area, and had also been watching the proceedings. We concluded that the work crews were building solar panels.

They were indeed. I don't think they've quite finished construction on the acres of off-the-grid green technology, and it's very hard to photograph them adequately from the Golf Links side. But here are some of them as seen from the Subway / Safeway parking lot.

Much as I love taking sunset photos, I'll happily trade that particular vantage point for DM going solar, and getting off the Tucson Electric Power grid. More power to them.

Karen

EMPS: Sometimes It's About Being Thankful for...Stuff.

For Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #65: Giving Thanks!, I suppose I could have showed you the Thanksgiving Pot Luck at St. Michael's this past Thursday, if I'd remembered to photograph it; or my beloved husband, if he allowed me to post pictures of him. I'm truly thankful for that pot luck at church, where I ate with friends and helped out in the kitchen, and got a plate of leftovers for my Wiccan friend who declined to attend, and would otherwise have been alone all day at Thanksgiving. And of course I'm thankful every day for my funny, cranky, smart, always-stimulating husband of thirty years (and counting).

But I didn't remember to take those Thanksgiving pics, and we didn't have much by way of turkey afterward, just enough for me to get a few meals of leftovers if I padded them out with Trader Joe's stuff and a frozen entree. Here's the box from that entree. Exciting, huh?

BUT! I'm also thankful for something material this year. You see, after 20 years without an accident, John has been rear-ended three times in the past six months -- and no, none of the accidents were his fault. He got a $2005 insurance settlement on the third accident, and was not inclined to spend it on fixing the car's trunk and taillight. Instead he's going to replace the dying hard drive on his Mac, and we got me a new computer. It's a desktop, for a change. John insisted that it's better than a laptop and likely to last longer. I still have my laptop for trips, at least until the motherboard finishes dying. So here it is: a $500 Gateway with 4 GB RAM and a 750 GB hard drive, plus an 18.5" monitor. John even admitted that it's faster than his Mac (when it's working), and the monitor is bigger. Windows 7 isn't compatible with my photo editor, so I was finally forced to upgrade to PhotoStudio 6. So I have working software again. Yay! It may be crass and material of me, but I'm thankful for my new computer.

And that's not all! We agonized for a good twenty minutes in front of four vacuum cleaners at Costco, ranging in price from $89 to $299. John tried opening the canister on the cheapest one to see how it worked, and fake dirt poured out onto the concrete floor! We ended up with the $139 Hoover. Now, if you're like me, you've probably had the experience of disappointing vacuum cleaners. You know: the demonstrators show the vacuum picking up fake dirt designed to be vacuumed easily, or maybe a bowling ball. But that's not what you need a vacuum to do, is it? You get it home, and does it pick up the dog hair? Probably not. But that's exactly what we needed it to do, and exactly why we stood there, agonizing.

But we picked one and took it home, and John tried it out even before we unpacked my computer. Amazingly, it picked up three canisters' worth of real dirt and dog hair(!) from the den alone! It works! It's wonderful! As wonderful as a vacuum cleaner can be, anyway.

So John is happy with that purchase - and that makes me thankful, too!

Karen