Seen above, Sulphur creek from the bridge on the north side of the Sundial from Friday. Seen below, the same creek yesterday, Monday, after a big storm blew through.
Also seen, this Rainbow over Redding. No sign of the rumored Irish guy at the end of it with a pot ‘o gold for you, though. A pot o’ debt perhaps. Luck of the Irish. Have a fun and safe St Patrick’s Day!
Amusing sign spotted on Mistletoe Avenue
Harleys in the Mall
A Black Swan event in Anderson
Thursday’s Chamber of Commerce Greeters was held at the beautiful Gaia Hotel. It’s a lovely property, built with the deliberate use of environmentally conscious materials.
Great turnout, and the food was terrific. The staff was first rate. These movers and shakers of the local business community remain upbeat in the face of the economic downturn. It seemed to me that there was more of an air of grim determination than I had noticed before.
These are 2 of the hotel’s 4 swans. A Black Swan is a metaphor for something that seemingly cannot exist, and then suddenly, it does.
1. Event has appeared by complete surprise.
2. Event has a major impact.
3. Event, after it has appeared, is ‘explained’ by human hindsight.
“The problem Taleb identified with banks and trading firms was that they were very vulnerable to Black Swans and were exposed to huge losses beyond what their defective models projected.”
Greetings from a world where Black Swans do exist.
The Statue of Income Tax
It’s a sign of the times. In our town, waving a sign isn’t just a job, it’s a career. Here we see Lady Liberty and her employees, on Lake Boulevard.
There is dignity in all labor, but you’d be hard pressed to identify that quality here; dressed up as a mock Statue of Liberty, hawking income tax services to passers by. I am in the car reflected in the window.
I was reminded only a little of the real statue. The original statue is a powerful monument, along with nearby Ellis Island, gateway to waves of hopeful immigrants. Below, we see one of my favorite family photos, from one of our trips to New York. It was taken by a passerby, who got on the ground with my camera to fit us in the frame with the non-inflatable version of Lady Liberty. It was a nice moment.
Our icons are disposable, apparently useful to the extent to which we can commercialize them. I just hope I don’t ever have to wave signs to eat.
Those Lotto left behind, the every day winners.
Insane Clown yard art
We drove by this on our way to show the house next door, southeast of Anderson. Every Realtor’s dream, to have yard art like this in the neighbor’s yard. Needless to say, our client was not thrilled with the house next door. Looks like a really bad horror movie scene.
And of course they felt compelled to put it under cover for protection. Of course.
A basket of Tulips
February is early Spring in Shasta County. We have lots and lots of emerging bulbs.
These showy tulips look wonderful all bunched together. Ironically, Tulip Mania was responsible for an economic bubble and collapse, similar to the housing cycle we are experiencing now. From Wikipedia: “At the peak of tulip mania in February 1637, tulip contracts sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled craftsman.” It seems our economic history is filled with bubbles and collapses.
It’s hard to capture an image that accurately displays their deep scarlet loveliness.
Such is the transitory nature of beauty.
Hawk on a limb photo
Took this one yesterday. Only got one shot before it flew off. Still, I like the composition.
I like to shoot birds. With my camera, I mean. Still, my shots are nothing compared to what you can find here:
http://CloudBoxer.com
Birds fighting in air. Really amazing high shutter speed shots. Seeing those, I don’t think the dinosaurs went extinct. I think they just became birds. Click on the image to go to their site:
1,474 Megapixel view of the Inaugural
Click on the image below to see a spellbinding view of the recent innaugural by David Bergman.
The photographer’s blogsite is here:
http://www.davidbergman.net/blog/2009/01/22/how-i-made-a-1474-megapixel-photo-during-president-obamas-inaugural-address/
Or at GigaPan here:
http://www.gigapan.org/viewGigapan.php?id=15374&window_height=867&window_width=1663
Really quite a technical photographic achievement that now has become an amazing artistic accomplishment as well. Well worth your time. Scrolling around, you really get a feel for how cold it was. And it’s also interesting to see just how many cameras were there, between the crowd and the pros. Obviously, it was an important moment, and it was covered. I have done many stitched panoramas for online home virtual tours, but this is more extraordinary by an order of a magnitude. The equivalent of 220 photos stitched.