My Last Day At 43
Forty-three. Oh forty-three. There will be a day that I miss you, but today is not that day. It goes without saying that forty-three was another lousy year in my life. I can only hope to turn the corner tomorrow when I turn forty-four.
Honorable Mention Is Better Than A Poke In The Eye With A Sharp Stick
Last night I submitted my first photo for review at the Roswell Photographic Society. The category for the evening was “Open (non-vintage)” which meant the subject matter could be anything I desired as long as the photo was taken within the last year.
My first thought was to submit this
but I feared that the subject matter was too common for this group. As it turned out, my friend Dave submitted a black and white print of this hood ornament taken from a different angle and took second-place in the “black and white print” category.
Instead I decided to submit something for the “digital” category that would be more controversial, something that I felt the reviewer would either love or hate.
When my image was displayed on the screen the reviewer thought for a second, mentioned something about it being lit well, but offered no other information because he said it was not something he would normally shoot. Ouch.
As is customary we all had to leave the meeting room so the reviewer could deliberate and choose his winners of each category. When we were allowed back into the room I found out that I was one of four Honorable Mentions for the “digital” category (there were also four photos that placed ahead of the Honorable Mentions). Not a bad result for a first attempt, if I do say so myself.
ITP Flickr Pic
Here is another shot that I took on Saturday’s Worldwide Photo Walk.
This moped was pretty cool. The BSS had an accompanying sticker on the gas tank which said Black Sheep Squadron; I thought that fitting.
Stay In A Chattanooga Hotel, Get Ready To Be Reamed!
On Friday night I am planning on driving to Chattanooga after work. The plan is attend a Chattanooga Lookouts baseball game and spend the night in Chattanooga. By executing this plan I will be about half way to Saturday night’s destination — Nashville.
Why Nashville on Saturday night? Because, thanks to Vic’s help, I scored a great ticket to the Neko Case show (whose opening act is Jason Lytle) at the Ryman Auditorium. What’s that? Why drive all the way to Nashville to see this show when they will be playing the Cobb (look how much we’ve gouged you) Energy Center on Sunday? Because on Sunday night I will be at the Variety Playhouse for the Old 97′s show.
But back to Chattanooga (and probably Nashville too)… Last night I started looking into booking a hotel room in Chattanooga. Like everywhere these days hotels aren’t cheap. After much deliberation I decided on which one I planned to book only to find out that the price being quoted did not contain a 17.25% hotel tax. 17.25%?!?!? W.T.F! Talk about screwing people over…
Twitterers, Beer, And Puppets? Oh My!
Tonight is the monthly Atlanta Twitter Tweetup. This month we’ll be invading the Center For Puppetry Arts at seven o’clock. I’ll be there early for a bit of networking and alcohol before heading out for a spot of dinner at some local restaurant.
The only downer for tonight’s event is that we’ve been instructed that no photography (or video) will be permitted due to copyright restrictions. I think that it’s always a shame to suppress creative outlets, especially in a building constructed to encourage creativity.
Stats & Goals
Daily
Current Mood – good, but I really need to step up my work
Current Music – listening to today’s tough Tour de France stage
Website Of The Day – There are a lot of interesting concepts on the web including the University of Nottingham’s Periodic Table of Videos
Mode Of Transportation To Work – my car
Exercise (b)Log – nothing
Morning Weigh-In – 199 pounds
Monthly
Foot Mileage – ~6 miles, Wheel Mileage – 0 miles
Consecutive Days Of Bed-Making (Longest Streak) – 18 (18)
Vegetarian Days – 2, Carnivorous Days – 18
Marta Rides – 0
July Goals
- Regain interest in my life
- Not get fired from my job
- Plan and lay a successful Black Sheep hash on July 19th
2009 Goals
- Reduce my weight to 190 pounds (today’s weight was 199.5 pounds)
- Completely read the book 1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die
- Earn at least $150 through photography sales in order to cover the cost for the renewal of the Jalapeño Beach SmugMug account I opened the other day.
- Save $500 for the sole purpose of donating to charitable organizations of my choice
- Attend at least one professional photography workshop
The Unmeasurable
- Continue backing up all data, including the off-site storage
- Become a proficient programmer in Objective-C (iPhone development) and Ruby on Rails (Black Sheep web page concept)
- Do not create a solution for something which is not a problem
Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]
Good grief, did we pay that kind of tax when we went to Chattanooga last year? I guess I didn’t notice and only paid attention to the priceline quote! We scored a nice room for under 100 bucks right downtown if I remember correctly but I will pay more attention to the tax next time! Happy birthday — 44 sounds young to me
Today is my last day at forty-three, so I’ll hold the birthday wish and use it tomorrow.
I suppose you paid that much in taxes. It’s quite possible the Tennessee State Legislature raised the rate this year in an effort to raise monies. Normally I pay no mind to it, but the rates I found were in the $80 range, which considering all I plan to do is sleep and shower, seems like a lot of money. And then to tag on another 17.25%…. I’ve considered finding a campground / RV park and sleeping in the Jackmobile. I’m perfectly comfortable with doing this, but I’m afraid that the baseball game will let out later than the gates will be open and I’d hate to pay for a camping slot that I can’t even use.
I’ve just started looking for rooms in Chicago for October…OUCH! Most of the places close to the start are in the $300 range (no idea what the tax rate will be). Slopes may have a deal for us, I’m hoping she does.
$300? You have expensive tastes! Unfortunately (for you) I canceled my Chicago trip prior to doing any hotel searching, otherwise I’d give you insight into what I found.
It wouldn’t surprise me if that’s $300 for a broom closet at the Lucky Leprachaun Motor Lodge on Route 3 about eight miles out of town. I guess Chicago hotels like to gouge the annual pilgrimage of marathoners.
I think when I visited Chicago a few years (three?) ago I paid about $150/night to stay at the Hard Rock Hotel. Of course that was in August, not during marathon time.
It sounds like you already booked a hotel, but in the future I recommend using Priceline for small cities like Chattanooga. I stayed at the Sheraton Read House in downtown Chattanooga earlier this summer for $45/night. It was a weekend, so I parked on the street outside the hotel for free too.
Bidding For Travel is a great site for knowing how to bid for hotels on Priceline. I was wary about using Priceline for hotels, but now I use it all the time. If you spend a little bit of time researching this website, you can bid (in smaller cities) with some certainty knowing which hotel you’ll get.
http://biddingfortravel.yuku.com/forums/84/t/Tennessee-all-other-cities.html
If you spend an hour or so reading Bidding For Travel’s FAQs, you’ll see that you can easily get free bids on Priceline without compromising the location/dates.
Actually I’ve yet to make a booking. I balked at the 17.25% tax and was seeking either a lower-priced hotel or an alternative sleeping arrangement.
I’ll check out Bidding For Travel tonight. Thanks!
Yeah, I know but I want to stay close to the start (Grant Park) so I’m looking at the Loop and Mag Mile areas. I don’t think I’m going to find much, if anything, under $200. Looks like the tax rate for Chicago is around 15%. I’m checking the other site as well, thanks.
Jerry is going with me (always good to have a coach/support team) so we might make it an extra long weekend away.
Happy b-day Wee, I loved the hood photo. When in Chatta see the international tow truck museum,it is downtown and was cheep the last time I was there. Have a great week.