Patsy Stone voice Thursday!

April 27, 2017, 4:45 pm

What an absolutely fantastic day. Thursdays are my day off from cooking dinner, so even though I have chores I usually do, I try to usually eat lunch out and enjoy the day as much as possible. Down at the tank farm, I started by finding a perfect spot for the time lapse.

I flooded Instagram with tons of gorgeous photos this morning. I've pretty much decided I'll post as many photos as I please. In the last few months, the quality of my internet experience has gone way downhill because everyone shares the same links and participates in the same memes, then there's the backlash, and then the backlash to the backlash. Meanwhile, the stuff that I'm really there for--original photos and updates about people's lives--gets buried. So I'll share as much of my own stuff as I please. I've noticed Instagram's algorithms sort stuff all over the place anyway.

But even though it's behind a cut, I still like to just show a selection. There's tons more on flickr, as always.

The time lapse vantage point selfie and today's awesome video.

Today's awesome walk, 6.76 miles in 2:35, 16,053 steps

6.76 miles in 2:35, 16,053 steps

For lunch, I got a sandwich and went down to the beach. I took this photo for Live in Everett, but had to re-shoot because there are penises carved all over this table. It worked out, though, because the other shot looks way better.

The walk to the beach and back got me another two miles, bringing my total today to almost nine. I had a time lapse set up near the car, but there wasn't anything interesting in it, so I didn't save it. Meanwhile, the clouds in every other direction were amazing.

One thing that made this afternoon really neat was all the people involved. The first place I went to try to buy a sandwich doesn't sell them, but the owner was super friendly. Then I ran into my friend Kristen near the bakery I ended up going to, and had a nice chat with her. The sandwich case at the bakery was already empty, but the owner offered to make me one, and the women she'd been talking to were really fun to talk to while she was making it. And then after all that, I had the beach all to myself the entire time I was there. What a fun day.

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SchadenFriday

April 28, 2017, 4:29 am

≫ Next: CATURDAY

≪ Previous: *Patsy Stone voice* Thursday!

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CATURDAY

April 29, 2017, 5:28 am

≫ Next: Phew

≪ Previous: SchadenFriday

BONUS Saturdogs

Many thanks to:
Animals Being Dicks
Señor Gif
k00l 4 k@+z
Almost Famous Cats
Cats, Beavers & Ducks
Derpy Cats
FAT CATS
FUCKYEAHFELINES!
CHEEZburger
Every Day is Caturday
Cats and Dogs
The Cat Reviewer
And everyone else who happened to put a cat or dog where I ended up seeing it this week!

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Phew

April 29, 2017, 11:33 am

≫ Next: Good to be home

≪ Previous: CATURDAY

I often take a little break at the end of the week and wait until Sunday to post about what happened on Friday. But by this point, there's so much to share, that it'd just be too much to add to whatever I get during tomorrow's walk.

The Boeing glow was the biggest I've ever seen. Normally I take the photo from the yacht club building, but this one was big enough that it was easy to get a photo from way over on the road.

IRL emoji.

Lots of cool plant/flower photos to get yesterday. Those are a great way to embrace the square Instagram format.

I love how the houses on Grand Avenue loom over the marina. Down at ground level, the left side is where all those herons were the other day. I wanted to check if they were still hanging around, but there was exactly one car parked right by there and it was awkward.

Thursday's special.

The sky over the water was amazing, and made me sad that I pointed the Podo toward the opposite direction hoping for a sunrise.

The Podo was attached to the rightmost picnic table leg.

Today's awesome walk, 6.08 miles in 2:10, 13,823 steps

6.08 miles in 2:10, 13,823 steps

Once I got home, I realized I could charge the Podo up while I showered, get the photos off it, then leave it outside all day. That came out nice.

Saturday's the only day of the week I don't have an alarm set for 4:00am. Today I woke up and checked the time. 4:05. It's fine, I don't really believe in sleeping in anyway. Perfect opportunity to retrieve the Podo, charge it for a bit, then set it up again for the sunrise. As gorgeous as it was, the trees make it hard to see most of the color in a wide shot.

Once that was over, there was a very nice view of the mountains.

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Good to be home

April 30, 2017, 6:21 pm

≫ Next: Not as planned, but good

≪ Previous: Phew

Today it makes sense to share the map first, because the route is the story.

Today's awesome walk, 8.8 miles in 3:18, 20,640 steps

8.8 miles in 3:18, 20,640 steps

I left the time lapse camera at the point where I turned East about halfway between the 1- and 2-mile markers. I decided at that point that I wanted to do my whole route North of there so I wouldn't have to walk all the way back up to that point later on if I went to the island or around the paved trail. Much of the path after mile 3 was wet, tall grass, so my feet were cold and wet until I got home. Pretty sure I won't go up that way again for a while unless they mow. There weren't too many dramatic sky moments, though I might have missed a few because I had to really watch the ground when I walked on the grass.

On Friday, my barber told me there used to be some houses here, and I confirmed that on an aerial photo from 1990. There isn't a trace of them at all now.

Flowers, etc.

The time-lapse perspective selfie.

Geese practically modeling.

The time lapse came out neat! First time in a while I liked the dashcam video, too.

Normally I'm not in much of a hurry to be done with the walk, but today it felt really great to get home and in the shower. Garrett had a craving for McDonald's breakfast and it really hit the spot. For dinner I made us pizzas using some frozen cornmeal crusts I found at the co-op the other day.

They both have sauce, onions, kalamata olives, low-moisture part-skim cheese, and feta. His has uncured pepperoni and mine has smoked oysters, my favorite pizza topping. We also had a salad.

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Not as planned, but good

May 1, 2017, 10:26 am

≫ Next: 50/50 shot

≪ Previous: Good to be home

Yesterday I put the Podo on the rail on our front porch to watch our trees and the sky behind them. I thought I set it for long enough to catch the sky going dark, but it ends a bit before that. That's too bad, but the video's still neat.

The fence behind the swim center was a good spot for today's video, but the sky just didn't cooperate. I made the video and decided not to publish it because there just wasn't anything to see. Kept the selfie, though.

It was a little close to the walking path and I worried the whole time I was inside that someone would steal it. I'll try again, but much further away from the path. I could have done that today but the grass was really wet and I didn't want my sandals to get soaked. That's probably better than a missing camera, though.

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50/50 shot

May 2, 2017, 2:58 pm

≫ Next: What a shift

≪ Previous: Not as planned, but good

After how magnificent the sky was at the marina last time I was there, but in the opposite direction from where I'd placed the Podo, I was looking forward to today's trip down. I pointed it toward the water because that was the better direction last time and there were no clouds to the East. All weather is subject to change, though, and pretty soon there was a lot more to see, including a wall of fog coming in from the South.

Fun with reflections.

The drama the Podo wasn't pointed toward.

A plane left a really nice contrail that stayed a long time and thankfully ended up in the video.

Yesterday's special. I like to think they're staying open later now because of the success of my blog post about them, but it's probably just because of summer.

It was too dark to know at the time that the shot was this off-kilter. Oh well.

Today's pretty squares.

6 miles in 2:04, 13,388 steps

I still like this video a lot even though it's the lesser of the possibilities from this morning. But there's no way of knowing when you set it up. Much like life, but far less important.

Yesterday I noticed one of my headlights was out, so today I took the car in to my friends' shop to have them both replaced. On the way home, I had two visits planned for an upcoming article, but only one of them ended up having what I was looking for. Still a tasty lunch for me, but the plan was to buy two and save some driving. Thankfully, with five total planned for that piece, four is still plenty.

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What a shift

May 3, 2017, 2:18 pm

≫ Next: 12 hours in 20 seconds

≪ Previous: 50/50 shot

It rained quite a bit overnight, but wasn't so bad when I got up. I'm always frustrated that I have to wait until 6am for the pool to open, but had a good idea to make use of the time.

The last time I tried to go to WinCo before the pool, it was a waste of time because I had to wait until 6am before they could sell me wine, and I couldn't get bagels at all because they weren't ready yet. There was no need to get bagels or wine today, so I went over there to get my shopping done, which got me to the pool at 6:05. Perfect, since I don't like to be part of the initial rush.

The deep end was pretty crowded, and I found myself having to move around a lot more than I usually do because so many people were going in every direction. It was fine, though. It's a little weird being the only one who isn't chatting with everyone else the whole time, but it's so much more enjoyable with music.

Speaking of which, this song came on and I laughed out loud.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBJvWjm6epY

(I'm going to start pasting URLs under the video embeds because the embeds don't work when I import over to Dreamwidth. And I haven't found how to embed one over there, either.)

When I got out of the pool, one guy chatted me up from the water, wanting to know if I'd been using some sort of flotation device. I said no, but fat is more buoyant than muscle alone so I don't have a hard time floating at all, even upright. He could still barely believe it, because he was holding on to a pool noodle or the edge a lot of the time, between bursts of practice. And he was in amazing shape. "You make it look so easy!" he said, and was shocked to find out I'd been in the water for a full hour.

I float easily and have strong legs, so give me a deep spot in the water and I'm happy. If I was in a race? Not so much.

The Podo was on my steering wheel with a view of the park. I hoped for a dramatic video of droplets on the windshield, but it didn't turn out interesting at all. Enough water to really obscure everything in the photo, but not enough to roll down very much.

The DJ on the radio said Seattle was going to be cloudy and rainy all morning, but then clear up and get up to 70 or so! The Podo's in the back yard looking up over the tops of some trees, hopefully that'll turn out cool.

I'd be getting the recycling and garbage ready right now, but I'm expecting a large delivery and may as well just use the box it comes in for the cardboard instead of the regular bin. While I wait, I'm watching The Final Terror on YouTube, an '80s horror movie starring Daryl Hannah (you know her!), Adrian Zmed (from Grease 2!) and Mark Metcalf (from the Twisted Sister videos!). I wanted to watch Willow, but the copy they have is just terrible.

It's really about time we got the future we were promised years ago: every movie ever made in every language, any time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ9qcp6Lcno

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12 hours in 20 seconds

May 4, 2017, 4:06 pm

≫ Next: SchadenFriday

≪ Previous: What a shift

I left the Podo out in the yard yesterday in the morning, and let it go all day. I didn't originally set it up to go that long, but it's pretty easy to stop it and start again without missing a beat. And that works out well because there's really no way to process that much time lapse all at once with my setup, so having two folders to start out with is just fine. For those who are interested, I've got my routine down to a science. No matter the time between photos in the lapse, I add them to my movie, edit so each lasts half a second, save the video, start a new project, then open that video and speed it up however much I feel like. And in the case of yesterdays, I repeat all but the last step, then make a new project out of both videos. I'm pretty quick at it now.

I really like how yesterday's long video came out. First it's overcast, then you see the sun, then it mostly clears, and finally the moon goes by at the end. So fun.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BTrWflyBp9t/?taken-by=xtopher575

It was really foggy out this morning, which made for a fun walk, but the video was boring. Couldn't even tell it was a time lapse! Of course, I kept the selfie.

That was after the walk, though. Here's the first photo of the day, during the only few minutes when it was dark. It got bright out surprisingly fast.

The walking trail along the water, which is off to the right. See the bunny?

Heading back the other way, the road to the beach. This will remain when the ferry terminal comes, but the path above won't. I think.

Today's pretty squares.

Over at Mukilteo Beach, I stumbled upon this very Hitchcockian scene.

Today's awesome walk, 5.4 miles in 1:54, 12,215 steps

5.4 miles in 1:54, 12,215 steps

It was still foggy well into the morning and I decided to set the camera up in the back yard again to see what would happen. Turns out the sun going by is pretty interesting. Glad I was in the basement with the curtains drawn as it went by.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BTro-ICh6A4/?taken-by=xtopher575

My first check for my blogging efforts came today! That's a fun milestone. I kinda want to get it framed.

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SchadenFriday

May 5, 2017, 6:35 am

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≪ Previous: 12 hours in 20 seconds

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CATURDAY

May 6, 2017, 5:37 am

≫ Next: A first time for everything

≪ Previous: SchadenFriday

BONUS Saturdogs

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A first time for everything

May 7, 2017, 2:48 pm

≫ Next: A first time for everything

≪ Previous: CATURDAY

In New Mexico, you can take driver's ed classes at age 14 and get your license at 15, and I did. I've had a license for 27 years and was never pulled over by the police until this morning. The headlight I had fixed on Tuesday was out again, and I hadn't noticed yet. Because of the stop, I got a late start to the walk, but it didn't matter too much because it was really cloudy. No sunset, but it still looked neat out.

The low water and light levels played well off each other.

It was quite the day for birds! I saw an eagle.

Two goose families, here's one.

A noisy hawk.

And this guy.

Plus a hot air balloon!

Squares of the day.

The time lapse spot selfie and the time lapse. I really like the train.

Today's awesome walk, 7.18 miles in 2:30, 16,158 steps

7.18 miles in 2:30, 16,158 steps

The sky was clearing up as I left, so this is the best drive video I've gotten in a while.

And here's yesterday's video, the camera was on the railing of our front steps all day. I love the strange blue beam that shoots down from the sun for a bit.

Today's Garrett's birthday! We had a nice brunch with his parents and then went back to their place for cake.

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A first time for everything

May 7, 2017, 2:50 pm

≫ Next: Details to come

≪ Previous: A first time for everything

The low water and light levels played well off each other.

It was quite the day for birds! I saw an eagle.

Two goose families, here's one.

A noisy hawk.

And this guy.

Plus a hot air balloon!

Squares of the day.

The time lapse spot selfie and the time lapse. I really like the train.

7.18 miles in 2:30, 16,158 steps

The sky was clearing up as I left, so this is the best drive video I've gotten in a while.

And here's yesterday's video, the camera was on the railing of our front steps all day. I love the strange blue beam that shoots down from the sun for a bit.

Today's Garrett's birthday! We had a nice brunch with his parents and then went back to their place for cake.

I figured out that the embeds I do here will work on dreamwidth as long as I copy the entry html before I save it and paste it into DW. The issue with the imports is that LJ wraps embeds in their own "lj embed" tag and that breaks them on DW. You'd think they'd have figured that one out, since "lj-cut" works just fine over there. Oh well. It's easy enough to copy and paste.

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Details to come

May 8, 2017, 5:17 pm

≫ Next: Details to come

≪ Previous: A first time for everything

Mondays at the pool sure are nice. I'd swim just about every day if I had my own pool, but since I don't, it's nice to have a good one in the neighborhood to visit a couple of times a week. I thought about hanging the camera off the back fence of the swim center but the sunrise coming through the trees looked nice from where I parked, so I put it on my steering wheel. You can barely see me in the photo because the sun's so bright.

I forgot to switch out the music on my swimming iPod, so I listened to Lip Locked 311 again. That was fine, because I got a shoutout in that episode, and forgot to mention it on last Wednesday's post. I listened to her show while I was decorating my room at the condo, and mentioned it to her on Facebook or Twitter, so she said hi on the next episode. It was her first one of 2014, so it's funny to remember that just after I finally decorated, we decided to list and move to Everett. Meanwhile, in TimeHop and Facebook memories, we're a few months later in the year, and I see the stuff from when we first moved up. Nostalgia in different directions, from every direction.

The time lapse is interesting but not as beautiful as the ones with a more open sky.

Whenever there's a squirrel in the yard, we call it Bobby. I wonder how many different squirrels we've pretended are the same one. I love his little arms in this.

I had a fun lunch today, but since it was for Live in Everett, I'll save those details for when it's published. Probably two weeks from Wednesday if they keep up the same pace.

At the grocery store on the way back from the pool, I decided today was a perfect day for a roast. It's been in the slow cooker and the house smells amazing, and I'm starving.

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Details to come

May 8, 2017, 5:17 pm

≫ Next: The moon also sets

≪ Previous: Details to come

Whenever there's a squirrel in the yard, we call it Bobby. I wonder how many different squirrels we've pretended are the same one. I love his little arms in this.

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The moon also sets

May 9, 2017, 12:48 pm

≫ Next: Icon origins

≪ Previous: Details to come

With my headlight still out, I decided I'd still go to the marina as I often do on Tuesdays, but keep off the main roads. That only added a few minutes to the drive, and I got there in plenty of time to set the Podo up. The original plan was to get the sunrise, but when I saw the moon, I had to point the camera at it.

Very lucky shot, here. They were walking toward the shadows and bobbing their heads a lot.

The moon hiding in plain sight.

If I owned a boat.

Today's pretty squares.

No Podo selfie today since it faced the water, but I found a nice spot for one.

Yesterday's special.

I'm so happy I figured out how to quickly flip photos on my phone. Sometimes they're just much cooler that way.

It's great when a new frame presents itself.

Today's awesome walk, 5.75 miles in 1:53, 12,464 steps

5.75 miles in 1:53, 12,464 steps

That moon! So glad I went out there today.

And here's another time lapse from yesterday. I left the camera on our water meter next to the house and let it go all day.

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Icon origins

May 9, 2017, 6:56 pm

≫ Next: It's your time, use it

≪ Previous: The moon also sets

Photo by

playmoby!

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It's your time, use it

May 10, 2017, 9:24 am

≫ Next: Overlap

≪ Previous: Icon origins

I stopped writing about yesterday when I came to lunch time because swim days can be pretty uneventful, so why not save some of the events to write about today? I went downtown to grab a couple of lunches for a Live in Everett post, because it's silly not to double up when the two restaurants I want to visit are on the same block. And there was enough left over for dinner. Perfect! But one thing I'll recommend for this particular dish that I'm writing about is calling ahead or ordering online, because it can be a bit of a wait. Not a big deal if you're hanging out there, but a bummer if you're doing takeout.

Downtown Everett's a great place to walk around, so after I ordered and paid, I let each place know I'd be back. Nearby, I found a little space between two buildings leading to a back entrance of a parking garage, which had some nice art. And thanks to the wide angle lens, I was able to get a picture of this one even though it's a narrow space.

This one's off to the side. I mostly liked the shadow.

It's likely you've heard of Funko, but you may not know they're based right here in Everett! Their factory is over in the big industrial area near Boeing and Paine Field, and they've just opened a new office HQ in downtown Everett, in an old department store building. It wouldn't be that interesting if it were just their offices, but they'll also have a retail store and an event space. Pretty neat! They have a really cool light-up sign that's a bit too tall for Instagram, so you can see that on my tumblr.

Vertical video is here to stay because of phones. Snapchat and Tumblr handle it properly, and Instagram does in their stories, but their regular post size is a bit too short sometimes. Every site and app that hosts video needs to just get with the times and display any dimensions that a phone can make. Without stupid black bars on the sides.

I put the Podo at the very end of the fence behind the swim center. Perfect spot, because it's really far from the footpath. But that also means you have to walk on a lot of grass to get there, so my sandals and feet got really wet. Yuck. But I wear sandals to the swim center specifically so I don't have to worry about wet socks and shoes, so I guess it's the best possible choice. It was a nice swim and I got a great video. I'll definitely use that spot frequently.

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Overlap

May 11, 2017, 3:41 pm

≫ Next: SchadenFriday

≪ Previous: It's your time, use it

Yesterday I met Kristen for a belated birthday lunch. She turned 40 a couple of weeks ago, and wanted to finally try Moontree Asian Tapas, a place I happen to love. It's at the marina, so I went a little early to set the Podo up for a lunchtime lapse.

I'm always really early, so I took the extra time after the lapse started to walk around the buildings a few times. That particular part of the marina always has really nice flower baskets, and the sun was bright, which made for perfect pretty squares.

Lunch was great, the visit was nice, and the time lapse turned out neat. I think the people in the first part had a close encounter with a seal or something, because just after they walked out of frame, I heard a big splash and saw them looking very startled.

I thought pointing the Podo at the ferries again this morning, maybe even from a spot much closer, but I noticed there was a barge with a huge crane up North, and couldn't pass that up.

It was too overcast for a real sunrise, though it broke through for a bit.

Today's pretty squares.

Today's awesome walk, 5.6 miles in 1:56, 12, 527 steps

5.6 miles in 1:56, 12, 527 steps

The cloud action was too good today to not also do a hyperlapse from the car. I especially like the part where I park for a few minutes for a bathroom break and to pick up the Podo.

Normally I use the phone to stop the time lapse when I retrieve the Podo, but I didn't want to interrupt the Hyperlapse. Since I left the phone in the car working on that, I just had to go stand in front of the Podo for a while to get this shot, and wouldn't know until much later how it looked.

One of the times I passed by, I noticed that I either didn't wrap the tripod around the signpost I used very well, or someone loosened it a bit, perhaps before reading the sticker explaining that a time lapse was occurring. That's why you see it shift a bit partway through.

Here's a video I made yesterday while working so hard to update my computer's operating system. Sam's timing was perfect.

Unfortunately, the USB ports would no longer work after the updates, and I spent about two hours trying to fix that before I gave up and reverted to the previous version. USB is far too important in my daily routine. By the time all that was sorted out, the morning had flown by and it was time for chores and lunch.

I've decided I really want LASIK. It's not wearing glasses that I mind, but rather having to clean them several times a day. Plus I spend a lot of time outside and in the pool, and it'd be so nice to be able to see better during all that. Most of the year is not glasses weather around these parts. I think I might get a consultation soon, and then do the procedure after the tattoos on my left arm are finished. A little break between tattoo projects when I can direct my money elsewhere.

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SchadenFriday

May 12, 2017, 5:48 am

≫ Next: CATURDAY

≪ Previous: Overlap

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