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The bird CEO of the Liberty Island flock.

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Celebrating the Holidays old school - with a slight twist.

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Merry Christmas and happy holidays.

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Dredging up childhood memories. I spent quite a bit of time every Sunday at the San Xavier Mission. Mom would drag us to mass all the way across town. The complaining only stopped on the 40 minute drive once there was a promise of popovers with honey. Which works even to this day.

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A Diamond T. It was a thing of beauty.

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The ultimate support hose.

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Greyhounds sprinting, one of the most beautiful sights in the world.

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Strolling the Natural Bridge in Virginia.

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Times Square.

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I could spend all day, every day shooting photos in NYC and never run out of things to photograph.

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Time for tea?

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NYC!

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The path to water, something you certainly don't see in Arizona often.

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Train station in NYC.

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Corn drying in the sun at the Natural Bridge in Virginia.

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So different than Tucson.

WEBSITE UPDATE

It amazes me that I think it was just yesterday when I posted the last blog and come to find out it has been a week. Sigh. I guess it was because of all the posts to the other site.

I have been diligently working on updating a number of new fine art print images to my website. That’s right! New stuff! Woot! Everything from nature scenes to classic cars to architecture. A number of the images are from my recent cross country trip so there is a nice variety of photos.

Go check it out http://www.backcountryphotographyaz.com/

Here’s just a taste of what’s been added.

The Lady

1932

Space Inside

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Old Greg's Road at sunset during the great cross country trip 2010.

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Another installment from the 2010 cross country trip. This was off Old Greg's Road in Tennessee.

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A touch of nostalgia.

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Another photo from the 2010 Cross Country trip. Levonne, I agree with you, thank you for the comment.

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And thus continues the great Cross Country trip of 2010. At the eastern end of New Mexico along I-40, (the fastest way not to see the country), was a Chevron Travel Center and the most surprising part of the trip. A showroom of cherried out classic cars and 1940s- 1950s memorabilia. I couldn't take photos fast enough.

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A pink Thunderbird. It was a thing of beauty and located in the most unusual place in New Mexico off of I-40.

FINE ART PRINT - ITCHING TO OPEN

Ooooooo, what is this? Another posting? 3 in two days? Inconceivable.

I'm feeling a little motivated this morning and as a result you are getting to see another fine art print from the '93 Toyota 2010 Cross Country Trip Collection :)

This one was also along the Cuba Landing Road. I was just itching to open the gate and go investigate that building. But, alas, this was as close as I got. I behaved. Sigh.

NEWEST FINE ART PRINT - ABANDONED

Did I not just say I would be posting photos of the cross country trip? This one was taken off Cuba Landing Road in Tennessee. It is one of my favorites from the trip and is available as a fine art print.

PHOTO CREDITS

Hi there! I bet you have been wondering "when is that girl going to get off her butt and post something new?". I certainly have. Things have been a little slow on the blog posting front because I have been out and about traveling across the country. That's right, I drove from Arizona to Massachusetts; which of course provided numerous photo opportunities. You will be seeing a number of them appearing on the blog over the next few weeks.

This post is actually about where you can currently find my photos, they've been cropping up in the oddest places. So go check out the most recent publications featuring my photos. A number of them revolve around the Meteorite Men TV show. (which is premiering the first episode of season 2 on November 2nd. Woo Hoo!)

-Make Magazine, Volume 24, October 2010, page 70, “Space Rock Hounds, A Q&A with the Meteorite Men” by Rachel Hobson. Print and online:

-Bloomberg, Business and Financial News, “Buried Nickel from Mars Lures Hunters to Texas Desert: Travel", by James Clash, September 21, 2010

-Tucson EZGuide Fall 2010 edition, cover photography and various interior images: September, 2010

-Denver EZGuide 2010 edition, cover photography and various interior images: September, 2010

- Tactical Pants Blog, "Tactical Talk: Meteorite Men’s Geoffrey Notkin", July 9, 2010 by Jeanette K.

- Rocks from Space website, picture of the day, June 21, 2010

-Rocks from Space website, picture of the day, June 6, 2010

And a few older ones that I hadn't posted yet.

-Values Magazine Japanese edition, summer 2010, Meteorite Men article by Jim Clash, p 98 – 99.

-Web site/blog photography Seize the Leash dog training; May 2010, http://www.seizetheleash.com/ and www.feeds.feedbuner.com/caninebehaviortraining.com

-“A Date with the Meteorite Men” article by Jim Clash; Spring 2010 Edition of the Explorer’s club Journal

-Tucson EZGuide 2010 edition, cover photography and various interior images: January, 2010

-Science Channel Meteorite Men website: photos in photo gallery: Jan 2010:

-Mr. Meteorite web page: Meteorite TV shows: Photos from filming the Meteorite Men TV show: January 2010:

- Flandrau Science Center video for the Science Café: “From Fallen Stars to Media Stars.”: January 7, 2010.

-tucsoncitizen.com: – The Logical Lizard - The Tucson Citizen Online blog post – “Meet the Logical Lizard at Flandrau’s Science Café tonight.” posted 1/12/2010.


Enjoy!

PEDIGREE BLOG HOP - WRITE A BLOG, FEED A DOG

So here's how it works: write a blog, feed a dog. Actually more than one dog, a bunch of dogs. Pedigree will donate a 20 pound bag of dog food for every blog that writes a post about the Pedigree Adoption Drive. There's one catch - there is a time frame; you need to post between Thursday, September 16th and Sunday, September 19th.

Include these bullet points in the blog and add your blog to the blog hop (below):

* Each year, more than 4 million dogs end up in shelters and breed rescue organizations. Pedigree created The PEDIGREE Adoption Drive to help shine a spotlight on the plight of these homeless dogs.

* This year the PEDIGREE Adoption Drive is raising awareness for homeless dogs by donating a bowl of food to shelter dogs for everyone who becomes a "Fan" or "Likes" the PEDIGREE Adoption Drive on Facebook. So far more than 1 million bowls have been donated.

* Special for BlogPaws West: For each blog that posts about the PEDIGREE Adoption Drive through September 19, PEDIGREE will donate a bag of its new Healthy Longevity Food for Dogs to shelters nationwide. It's simple: Write a post, help a dog.

* Thursday, September 16 through Sunday, September 19, the Pedigree BlogPaws bloggers will host a Blog Hop to help raise awareness for the "Write a post, help a dog" effort.

So join the Blog Hop hosted by Pedigree BlogPaws by adding your name to the ever growing blog roll, get the linky code below and put it in your post (see where it says "get code here" at the bottom of all the list of all the blogs that are participating) and go back to your blog and post, even if your blog is not a pet related blog. Go. Right now. Scootch.

THEN THE THUNDER CRACKED AND I RAN

The story goes something like this…

We had a wonderful daytime thunder and lightning storm today. A bit more than the standard monsoon, though we started with blue skies in the morning and the clouds building by about 1 pm. Once the storms rolled in I decided to take a little break from the office to enjoy the rain. The smell of rain was on the freshly kicked up winds, lightning was flashing and the thunder rumbling, bringing the promise of even more exciting storm activity in the future.

Though I thought to just sit and enjoy the storm, I couldn’t resist trying to capture the wonderful activity and retrieved my camera and one of the tri-pods from inside. I started playing with the settings, trying to capture the lightning flashes. No go, through the artificial dark of overcast monsoon skies it was still daylight, so the time exposures didn’t work, all I got was white. I tried some regular shots just trying to time the lightning flashes to my clicking of the shutter but the strikes were not the crawl leisurely across the sky type of lightning, they were of the sharp rapid strike variety and far too fast for my measly reflexes.

Then some lightning flashes from behind me caught my attention and as turned from the main storm activity I noticed the stalk of an agave plant, next to its fallen comrade which was leaning against a saguaro highlighted against the sky. Due to the overcast and weird storm lighting, the vegetation was nearly a silhouette against a stormy grey backdrop. Ohhh, fun with shadows and weird natural lighting, my favorite.

I removed the camera from the tri-pod for more mobility and with light rain falling and lightning all around I bravely stepped from the cover of the patio to play with the composition of the shot. About 5 minutes in to my venture, there was a bright flash and an enormous crack as lightning and thunder exploded around me virtually simultaneously. I’ll be honest, I let out a squeak followed by a swear word, managed to jump and duck like I was dodging gunfire at the same time and ran like hell towards the safety of the covered patio. As I finished my 20 yard dash, I realized the flash of the lightning happened about the same time I shot the photo.

Could it be? Nahhh. But just incase the impossible happened…I flipped the camera to review -

Woot! I caught the lightning strike. Talk about perfect timing!

So a bit about this photo: it was taken on regular auto camera settings, not on elapsed time exposure and without the use of a tri-pod on my Canon G-10. It is a color photo and has not been enhanced or digitally altered in any way, (including cropping). Since the image is not blurry, (and trust me I moved when that thunder cracked) all I can figure is that the shutter clicked closed in the split second between the lightning and ensuing startled movement from me that followed the thunder clap.

And least to say, this image is available as a fine art print. I actually had the settings on the camera correct so it can easily be enlarged to a 20 x 30 print.

PHOTO FOR THE DAY

A small section of a lovely mural decorating one of Tucson's best and most secret historic sites, The La Pilita Museum and the adjacent National Historic El Tiradito Shrine are just a stone's throw from downtown Tucson. The Shrine is the only National Historic site dedicated to a sinner. I love Tucson.

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We had a wee tiny visitor in the office last night. He/she somehow managed to find a way inside, which couldn't have been overly difficult as he was only as big around as a pencil. I was closing up shop and getting ready to leave for the evening when I stopped short, after I came around a table, at this fake plastic snake my co-workers had left for me to find. You know the ones you see in tourist places usually represented by an entire bin of curving plastic and wavering tongues?

This one was in that classic 'S' pattern with head slightly elevated off the floor and not moving at all. No waver, period. No tongue flicks, not a movement of the eye, nothing. So as my brain is trying to process if it was actually fake or real, I moved in a bit to examine it up close. It was the best fake snake I had ever seen!

I had just made the decision to reach down and pick it up when he jetted away to safety under our tablecloth draped work table. OK, yes, I'll admit, I let out a surprised 'whoa' and danced backwards a few steps. Then I did the girlie thing and called my male co-worker, Tim, who had just left the office not 20 minutes previous, to come back please, please, please and help me catch him. Mostly because I realized there was no way I could catch that little guy by myself, the rest being, well --- snake!

Just so you know, chivalry is not dead and Tim, snake catching tools in hand, was back at the office in about 15 minutes. By that time the little guy had left the cover of the table and migrated to behind a big display cabinet. Tim gently prodded from one side of the cabinet and I set up a snake corral with a couple of boxes at the other. Within 5 minutes the little fellow was curled up into a snake ball in the bottom of the box and being relocated to the desert-like rear yard.

Whew, what an evening. I really don't remember snake wrangling being part of my job description :)

Our visitor after being relocated to the back yard.

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I have mentioned before, I have another blog (Cult of the Greyhound) and I try very hard not to double-dip on the photos. But with this one, I just can't help it. One of my favorites to date.

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Last night a group of us went to Gates Pass to watch the Perseid meteor shower and my good friend, and the most amazing photographer, Leigh Anne and I set up the cameras. Though I didn't get any shots of a shooting star, I did capture the flight of a helicopter. I had a great time with experimenting with the camera, since it was the first time for me to do time elapsed shots. AND we saw 215 meteors. Sweet!

I'm going back to bed now :)

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Juicy fruit of the hackberry.

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I love historic buildings. There is so much character.

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Just 'cuz I thought it looked pretty.

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This is an old fish run we came upon after 2.5 hours of hiking near Lake Tahoe. We still had another 2.5 hours to get back to the car. By then I was wishing they had a people spill way that would carry me all the way out to the parking lot.

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Purple prickly pear. How much fun is that?

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A surprise shot. I love it when I look through photos I've taken and realize one came out really well though not as intended. This color photo of an aspen trunk set against a lava flow background was one such image.

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One of my favorite fine art prints. Prickly Pear fruit ripe to bursting, freshly washed in a summer monsoon. Mom used this as her Christmas cards last year: "Red, green and screaming of the desert. Perfect."

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Before and after.

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I'm fascinated by the delicate intricacies of nature.

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Beginning a new journey. Where should the travels take us now that we are released from our tether?

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Things in the desert tend to be poky.

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WATER! We had a spectacular monsoon storm last night. Thunder, lightning, and torrential rain at my house. Punctuated by a span of 45 minutes of eerily silent dark without electricity. No sound of the air conditioner, computer fans or refrigerator. Wondering what I would do with the dogs in the morning if it didn't come back on. On the walk this morning, with eyes feasting on the rich colors of sparkly clean everything and surrounded by moist dirt smell, I watched cars swerve just to go through the puddles. The rain brings out the kid in all of us desert dwellers.

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RAIN!!! We had rain yesterday. There's nothing like the first real storm during the summer in Tucson. I can't tell you how many people I saw standing outside, arms out, looking up at the sky, grinning like fools and splashing in puddles. And people driving with arms hanging out open car windows just soaking in the moisture. Thunder, lightning and a spectacular sunset. Yesterday was a good day.

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A touch of the southwest.