Candy Piles

Thursday, November 1st, 2007

Well, another Halloween on Rosalie has come and gone, with only a dozen or so trick or treaters... kind of a bummer, but also kind of nice in that we got to spend more sit-down time with Tom and Jane, who were kind enough to come over and experience Lisa's impressive hostessing skills. Our heat is also finally switched to "on", after that one evening earlier this week, where it dipped into the 30s! So I look forward to a warm home filled with candy and leftovers!

Here are Tom and Jane. Tom is watching Jane shake a glass jar of angry honey bees, as she makes sleepy faces.

Lisa treats us all to a game of "do I have a face or not?" Peekaboo! She does!

I need a haircut. Badly. Gonna get one tomorrow night.

So yeah, we had a wonderful time, watching Pushing Daisies and eating chili!

Song in iTunes - The Decemberists - "On the Bus Mall"

Flowers and Grandmas

Tuesday, November 27th, 2007

Man, the month got away from me! Be sure to check the "Typotterkampf!" link to the left for updates of a model-making nature.

So over the past three weeks, we have visited Longwood Gardens, had Thanksgiving at my moms, and have started getting ready for the holidays!

Longwood is about an hour and a half North from the house, and every year Lisa and I go up with Tom and Jane. It's always wonderful.

This particular weekend featured dancers dressed up as wicker-based insects. Pretty cool construction techniques.

I love my new camera... it has a Leica lens, and seems to capture color accurately.

Grasshopper eats kid brains!

Hey, Bioshock! I love youuuuuu...

Creature from the Black Lagoon's girlfriend decorated the lagoon this year.

A rose, I guess. I am indifferent about roses, but the color was too good to pass up posting.

This time, I was fixated on Longwood's buildings - man, I love the greenhouses.

And the gears? Awesome.

So, on to my Grandmother's house. It's funny - I have never really done what I say I'm always going to do - document the places I live in/remember. Things change at lightening speed, and I wish I had just simply documented rooms of my house/parents house/etc as I grew up. I wish I took photos of Annapolis in the 80s and 90s. Everything is so different now, and my memories are fading about the particulars. So I took the opportunity on Thanksgiving to photograph my Grandma's house in Severna Park, where I have thousands of fond memories.

This is the Grandfather clock that I was apparently obsessed about as a toddler. I always have loved it, and the story goes that when I was still in diapers, I opened the bottom door and got a big handprint on the inside of the glass. My Grandfather thought it was so cute, he wouldn't let my Grandmother wash it off, and it stuck around for a long time. It was common knowledge that my Aunt Suzanne was to inherit the clock, but she passed away a few years ago, so I think I'm to inherit the clock now. I miss Suzanne and my Grandfather, and this is one of a scant few objects that hold real meaning to me, in the category of "family heirlooms"...

That knight/shield and swords have hung over the entrance to the downstairs all of my life, and I can't think of them NOT there - or anywhere else.

Same goes for the guns my Grandfather hung - most of them real, including the WWII Japanese rifle - GOD I love that thing. You can see how my Grandma has stamped herself into this area, as my Grandfather passed away 20 some odd years ago. Take out all of the angel statues and floral furniture, add a TV with football on it, and a Budweiser on the table, and it's how the room is "supposed" to look in my head. See the lowboy on the right? It hides a big 'ol Hi-fi, records, etc - you can see the speakers on the back wall, built into the other cabinetry. My grandfather built all of this stuff, and he also built speakers into cabinets upstairs - all connected to the turntable. One last note - my mom painted the ship on the wooden barrel top hanging on the right-hand-side wall.

On that back wall hangs the Blake crest - something I sooo wanted when I was a kid. how cool is it to have a cool symbol for your family name, on your wall?

The basement that my Grandfather built - it had a bar, pool table, and black and white TV. I watched endless episodes of Battlestar Galactica, The Voyagers, and Buck Rogers down here in the late 70s.

Look up into the living room that no one ever uses ;) It is immaculate!

The kitchen, which looks smaller in this photo. It used to be fully carpeted, which is something I still can't wrap my brain around.

Part of the back yard, where we spent so much time as kids. I wonder how many GI Joes and Star Wars figures are under 5 inches of dirt?

This is the side where we woudl set up the slip and slide. Behind us would be the adults with horseshoes and beer!

This is the court where, as kids, we would ride pedal cars and play "crash up derby" - my cousins and my brother and I woudl pedal furiously into one another. The pedal cars were metal, and we were 5-10 years old, I reckon. I also distinctly remember playing with my Buck Rogers and Twiki action figures along that brick wall.

This is the house and lion-topped pillars. As a kid, I used to scream "don't hit the bricks!!" at anyone backing down into the court. Occasionally someone would. See the bricks on the right side wall? Heh.

Lion!

At one point, that "Florida Room" (the darker shingled part of the house in the back of this photo) didn't exist, and it was a porch. I used to play army men on this porch and see slugs under the wood.

The back yard "courtyard" is very lush these days - I'm going to see if I can find pics from the past to show you what these rooms and places looked like, growing up - stay tuned!

Scanning it, Old School

Thurssday, November 29th, 2007

So I have finished the dreaded yearly back up - this time, just my iTunes data took up 63 dvds. Almost 260 gigs... unreal.

I also just scanned a whole mess of photos for a Christmas present for my Grandma - I'm making her a book, spanning the years. I uncovered some cool stuff.

A photographic record of the kid dressed as a bologna sandwich! Referenced and made "famous" here!

My favorite Cure shirt of all time, peeking out from under a shirt I have absolutely no memory of owning.

My friend Gregg, captured at a band practice. He modified the print when we got it back from the one hour photo place.

Guess who's mesmerized by fire on his first birthday? ME!

Apparently it was perfectly acceptable for me to eat batter off the floor like a goddamn dog? Okay 1970s, you win.

Ohhh, that explains it. My mom's grandfather, my mom (and me at negative 0), and her uncle.

My grandfather, apparently watering my confused baby head. So... that explains why I'm "weird", maybe?

This is a photo of either Sheba r Cleo as a kitten, but the reason I'm posting it is so you can compare the decor with the pics I posted in the previous entry. My Grandmother has not redecorated in over 34 years, which I am absolutely fascinated by. She has modified things here and there, and has certainly added to the collections, but certain key items are forever stuck in place, which I find oddly reassuring. The swords and knight above the entry to the lower level, the Blake crest, brass plates, guns, eagle - all still on the walls. Note the TV waaay down in the back of the den - that was the tv that forever had football playing on it.

The couch is different, the drapes are different, and the floor (not shown) is different - but that's pretty much it!

Same goes for the opposite view - those wall dressings are exactly as they were, 34 years ago. Too cool.

Cool pic of me and armor. W00t!

I love this one too - my mom and me, downtown Annapolis, in what is probably 1974. That carriage is crazy!!