Georgia State Fair

Canon EOS 30D, Canon EF-S 17-40mm 1:4 L lens, 200 ISO f16 at 2.5 seconds


Last night, I met my friend Bonnie at the Georgia State Fair in Macon. The state fair is a build up for the much larger Georgia National Fair in Perry in a week or two. The crowds were down...I am not sure if it was because it was Friday night and there were several local football games, the economy in general, or due to the Presidential debates....but in any case, it just seemed dead, as can be noted by the stance of the two guys running the ride in the top photo.






This swirl of light is actually a carousel. You can just barely make out the vertical bars on which the horses and riders sit.

Canon EOS 30D, Canon EF-S 17-40mm 1:4 L lens, 200 ISO f22 at 5 seconds














Canon EOS 30D, Canon EF-S 17-40mm 1:4 L lens, 200 ISO f9 at 1/2 second









The big Ferris wheel was a much photographed feature. I tried fast exposures, slow exposures, and everything in between. Most of the shots seemed ordinary, but I liked these two...just to show it at different angles.





Canon EOS 30D, Canon EF-S 17-40mm 1:4 L lens, 200 ISO f9 at 1 second












And here is probably my favorite shot of the night (click to enlarge)....the real reason people come out to the fair....roasted corn, polish sausage on a stick, cinnamon rolls, gyros, turkey legs, and funnel cakes....all at ridiculously inflated prices!


Canon EOS 30D, Canon EF-S 55-250mm 1:4-5.6 IS lens, 800 ISO f5.6 at 1/40 second

The Bridge to Nowhere?

Ocmulgee Indian Celebration

I was gone to South Carolina this past weekend, so I missed the annual Ocmulgee Indian Celebration at the Ocmulgee National Monument. Below is a video slideshow of some of the photos that I snapped at last year's event.

Bored, Tubby, & Mild

A friend emailed this to me....I thought it was so funny....probably because so much of it is true! Turn on the speakers and click the cartoon to start the fun

Waterfalls

Sorry for not posting in a few days...been off camping.

I spent the last few days near the Cherry Hill Recreation Area along the South and North Carolina line, near Cashiers with six friends. We camped there and spent several days hiking the trails. I tried my hand at capturing moving water....with only so-so results. I wrestled with blurs, overexposure, and poor composition. I guess it just wasn't my best.





Here is a shot of Whitewater Falls, a very large (400+ feet) waterfall in North Carolina. Unfortunately, you can't easily approach the actual water without a very tough climb. So, you only get a photo from a long distance away.

For a closer waterfall, we did a short mile hike to King's Creek Falls. This easy hike ends at the foot of a forty foot waterfall. It is much more approachable and still lovely.

Only two bad things on the whole trip...my brakes went bad on my truck on the way home...and one of the nearby campers had a bit of a spat with their spouse after drinking a bit during the middle of the night. They shared their true feelings toward each other in a multitude of four letter words and actions. Despite these two things, it was a great trip!

Out the window...

Callie takes a look out the front window, probably fantasizing about chasing the squirrels in the yard. She has been a mood all day today; because this morning I gave her a flea treatment. She hates the flea medicine; but it does keep the little bugs at bay. So whether if she likes it or not, it is a reality. Around here, the fleas are terrible in the yard...another reason that I don't let her go out too much.

And just as I was typing the sentence above, she rolled off of her perch on the window, and fell to the floor. It scared her to fall, and she came running over to me for some comfort. She doesn't seem to have any sore places, so I suppose that she is ok.

Who said cats are graceful?

Gasoline costs

No pretty photo today...sorry. Just a gripe about the sudden skyrocket flight of the cost of gasoline. I checked on the Gas Buddy website and found that Georgia has among the highest prices in the nation today for gas! Normally, we are toward the middle or even the low end. But for some reason, the prices here have really been impacted by the fear of gas production problems resulting from Hurricane Ike in Texas. The two maps are from the Gas Buddy website and show the average price for regular gasoline today in each county. Click on the national map to see it a bit bigger. Go to the website to see current prices in your area.

And as luck would have it, we are even in the orange shade on the Georgia map of counties! It could be worse...our next door county is in the dark red. Still, it is bad enough.

On a totally unrelated side note, the muscadine jelly that I put up this week turned out wonderful. I opened the first jar today and gave it a taste. I might have got it a tiny bit too sweet, but it will be good on a hot biscuit anyway! Yum!

Muscadine & Scuppernongs

After work today, I grabbed a bucket and filled it with muscadines and scuppernongs off of the vines that are growing all in my backyard. The scuppernongs were a cultivated variety that was planted many years ago by the previous owner. The muscadines are just wild vines that are growing in the trees and bushes. I am going to try to make a few jars of jelly. I consulted the Internet and found a lot of different recipes. In the end, I did the smart thing and picked up the phone and called Mom. She always puts up some really good muscadine jelly each year. So the juicing is all finished and the juice is setting in the fridge overnight to settle and clarify. I will sweeten it and add the pectin tomorrow and put it into jars in the canner. It is a little work and a tad bit messy, but the end product is so worth it!

A few night shots

I wandered about town after dark, snapping lots of photos with my point and shoot camera. I was just wanting to see how well it would handle the dark. The autofocus isn't the best in the world under low light conditions, but the exposure is pretty good. Below are the Hay House and the Woodruff House in Macon, GA
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Up and Over

One of the arched bridges on a footpath at Ocmulgee National Monument in Macon, GA.







Not sure which photo that I like better, if either of them. I had a notion of what I wanted the image to look like; but I was never really able to make it happen.

Progress of my parent's house

I spent the Labor Day weekend at my parent's new house. They are still living in the camper, but are only 2 weeks away from being able to move into their new home, if everything goes right. The bulk of what is left to do is just the flooring. Dad is still working on the tile work. The contractors are coming Tuesday and Wednesday to install the faucets and toilets, and at the end of the week, they are installing the wood floors and carpet upstairs. If you compare where the house was two months ago, then quite a bit has been done is a short time.

Here are a bunch of photos, if you are interested. Click on the small photo to enlarge it, then click on your back button to return here.