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Monday, September 24th, 2007
Yesterday brought the marriage of Akiva and Shae in a beautiful ceremony. Attending was an interesting experience for me as this is the first Jewish wedding I’ve ever attended. While I didn’t directly understand any of the Hebrew prayers or blessings it was still fun to observe. I was very touched by how emotional Akiva got – he was shaking during the ceremony, and you could tell it really was a bit overwhelming for him.
The photo above is my favorite couples shot. I also really liked this shot of Eric, my capture of Shawna’s back, and this trippy twin-like shot of Troy. For all photos from the wedding check out my Flickr set of their wedding, or check out their Flickr wedding pool where hopefully other guests will also post some of their photos.
Congrats guys – myself and all your friends are wishing you the brightest of futures and the best of lives together!
McHorrible
Thursday, September 20th, 2007I had a few errands to run on my way home today and I happened to pass by a McDonalds, only to be stricken with a horrible craving for a Big Mac. I semi-reluctantly stopped in for dinner, and I do have to say for the record that my Big Mac Extra Value Meal was salty, fatty, and delicious.
Now three hours later I remember why I haven’t eaten at McDonalds in the last 3 years: I feel like absolute shit. My body is rebelling in the face of a giant lump of fat, salt, carbs, and preservatives is now slowly working its way through my gut, sapping me of every last shred of vibrancy and humanity.
Remember folks: when the craving comes just say no!
Well, that’s another year gone by
Sunday, August 5th, 2007Well it was bound to happen sooner or later: I turned 26 and I’m now in the last year of my mid-twenties. 26 doesn’t seem any different from 25 was, or even the year before. Change in my life seems more gradual these days, a side effect of getting older I suppose; each year being less tumultuous and seeming shorter given it’s comparative length is shorting as my life experiences lengthen.
My actual birthday was last week, but I didn’t celebrate too much on that day so as not to make the next day at work not be a living nightmare. Brien bought me 300 on HD-DVD and took me out for a nice dinner. I did crack a tooth at dinner (on Pad Thai no less?!) which did manage to put a bit of a damper on things, but overall it was a great end to the first quarter century of my life.
Yesterday was my annual birthday movie marathon. Some very good friends came by to have a drink, watch movies (this years theme was Action!), and celebrate the passing of another year. After a number of flicks (and much berating of Judge Dredd – how blasphemous) we dined and I went home to snuggle in bed with Skype.
This morning I took a photo walk with my lensbaby while in quite the strange mood. All of my shots today feel very experimental for me – not what I would typically look for in shots. I like what I got – check out the the all of todays photos, or see my two favorites below.
This poor abandoned TV got quite a few treatments and this ended up being my favorite. Blur effect done entirely in camera with the Lensbaby. I keep feeling like this photo makes some profound statement about the grand life-cycle of technology, but capturing that statement and writing it down eludes me.
“Televised” by sparktography
This shot is another in my sticker series. I’m highly amused by this angry little cloud. It was taken on the side of a Seattle Weekly newspaper box, and recently it looks like someone spilled some bright red/orange paint down the side putting this poor sticker in jail.
“Cloud in jail” by sparktography
The Pizzazz pizza cooker
Monday, April 2nd, 2007
After discovering its existence a mere week ago on Boing Boing I decided I had to purchase Presto Pizzazz Pizza Maker from Amazon. It’s the best of “Buy now from TV” come to life – nearly instant pizza, with no muss, no fuss. It’s designed to cook 7 to 12 inch pizzas from start to finish in under 15 minutes and does a damn fine job of it.
How sad is it that I cook frozen pizza frequently enough that it’s worth spending nearly $50 on a device aimed at cooking pizza faster (and better) with less cleanup when I have a perfectly servicable oven. Heck – as you can see from the above in-process photos I even put the Pizzazz on my oven to cook it.
I wrote a review of the Pizzazz on Gear Live if you want to learn more about my experience.
“Pizzazz process” by sparktography
A fun day: family and technology
Friday, March 23rd, 2007My cousin Heather was in town this evening with one of her friends so we went out to hit the town. Her 23rd birthday is tomorrow so I took her out for some Sushi and a birthday drink at Blue C. It was good to see her, and a good start to a family-tastic weekend: tomorrow morning I’m headed up to Abbotsford to see my Grandpa, Uncle, Aunts, and other cousins. Sadly Grandpa has not been doing as well, so I think it will be good for the family to get to hang out with him for a while.
In technology news I’ve been on one heck of a spending spree – I need to stop! In two days I’ve purchased both a GPS unit for my car, and one of the new Apple TV’s. The GPS unit is cool (and might help keep me from getting lost), and makes up for one of the two missing features in the A6. The other missing feature is rain sensor wipers and I doubt if there is a way to hack that in after market.
In a way I’m looking forward to the drive tomorrow as it will be my first long haul in the A6 (now affectionately named the PimpMobile (in honor of Bender)), and a great chance to play with the GPS unit. I already asked it to calculate the route up to Abbotsford and it is a different one than I’m familiar with. Looking at the details in Google Earth it actually looks to be a faster and shorter way there so I think I’ll give it a go.
The Apple TV is great so far. Exceptional and simple out of box experience (like all Apple products in recent years), and the initial setup was a breeze. I plugged it in to the wall and to HDMI and I was off. After selecting my 802.11n network, entering the WPA password, and selecting the computer I wanted to sync with it was ready to use. Total time from plugging it in to me watching an episode of the Colbert Report: 2 minutes.
Sunday brunch
Sunday, February 25th, 2007
My friend Alissa (pictured above – another shot is here) has a crepes brunch at her house today. It was simply delightful! I got to meet a lot of her friends, as well as hang out with my old recruiting buddy Ron for a while. Everyone brought a crepes topping and we all talked, took photos, and played Settlers of Catan for about four hours.
After the brunch I had Mike and company over for some video games, bad movies, and pizza – all in all a very satisfying end to my weekend. We played some Crackdown and watched the worst movie in history: Mazes and Monsters.
Speaking of Crackdown it’s a fantastic – if not short – game. I beat the final boss today and discovered it’s twist of an evening. I kind of wish they had delayed the launch slightly and added more content – but that can’t be helped. It was well worth the money I spent on it to get a week of fun running around on the rooftops causing chaos.
“Sultry Alissa 02” by sparktography
A to Z: it’s Blog-O-Meme time!
Monday, February 5th, 2007A is for age: 25
B is for beer of choice: Pyramid Ales, Apricot Amber
C is for career right now: Program Manager out at the big borg
D is for your dog’s name?: Skype!
E is for essential item you use everyday: My cameras
F is for favorite food: Steak, steak,steak!
G is for favorite game: Oblivion
H is for Home town: Walla Walla, WA
I is for instruments you play: A loooong time ago I played the flute
J is for favorite juice: Odwalla
K is for whose butt you’d like to kick: George W. Bush’s
L is for last place you ate: Red Robin
M is for marriage: and the horrific legal ramifications it stands for
N is for your full name: Sparky
O is for overnight hospital stays: Several pneumonia related incidents as a child
P is for people you were with today: Brien and a bunch of co-workers
Q is for quote: “Kill all humans” – Bender
R is for Biggest Regret: Not quitting my job at Greythorn years earlier
S is for status: terminally single
T is for favorite TV show at the moment: Battlestar Galactica
U is for underwear you have on: Calvin Kline boxer briefs
V is for vegetable you love: Avacado
W is for worst habit: Smoking more nicotine than I should
X is for x-rays you’ve had: Chest, head, mouth, and chest, chest, chest
Y is for yummy food you ate today: Banzai Burger at Red Robin
Z is for the zodiac sign: Leo
Thanks Phil!
I feel great!
Wednesday, January 24th, 2007Yesterday was a cleansing day – no nicotine, no caffeine, no meat, no sleeping aids- nothing but 128oz of water and some veggies and I feel great for it. I had been feeling tired for a while so I thought giving my body a day to get itself back up to speed was in order. I can tell I needed sleep because after dinner I got tired at 7pm. 12 hours of sleep later I feel great!
The food of many lands.
Sunday, January 21st, 2007
Today involved much good food and relaxation. I went to the Taj in the University district with Scot for lunch and got a healthy dose of chick peas and pannier. On the way out I stopped to snap a few photos of the mural they have outside their parking lot and managed to snag the above dreamy shot.
Dinner was sushi (after several traffic and timing aborted sushi missions in the last week) at Blue C with Brien. Getting there was still trouble (why does getting to Fremont insist on sucking so much?) but we were rewarded with a bounty of delicious mercury laden fish!
“Mural of India” by sparktography
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