Monthly Archives: August 2015

Ruby Tuesday – Rainy Day at the QT

#QuikTrip on 75 at Skiatook exit Saturday morning #Latergram #Reflections #Red #Architecture

Scene at a gas station /convenience store on a rainy morning north of Tulsa.  At the QuikTrips people are coming in getting gas, coffee, breakfast wraps, and sandwiches. Everybody that comes in is greeted. The stores are constantly clean and continuously updated. Stores like QuikTrip and others are killing some of the other chains like Shell and others in the Tulsa area. I don’t mean to sound like a commercial but the plethora of abandoned Shell and other stations in Tulsa has really been a subject of mine on this blog.

Linking with Ruby Tuesday Too

Scavenger Hunt Sunday – Natural Light Edition

1. What I’m Doing Today

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I helped son with his Drama Class project to build a model theater today. So we got the seating, stage, left wing, right wing, fly space, sound booth, lighting booth, apron, orchestra pit, lobby, and the final bit is the ticket booth. Then we are going to have to pretty it up a little bit.

2. Inside

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It has been hot lately and Logan has done his riding classes inside the arena. Around and around he goes.

3. Candid

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Logan and I go walking around Tulsa’s Lafortune Park. It has a three mile loop and sometimes when we find a shade we rest.

4. Yum

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Saturday evening we went downtown and ate some barbecue and then walked to the Tulsa Drillers game. I had the smoked chicken dinner, fried okra, baked beans, and a Marshall Brewery’s “This Machine” IPA. Yes it was yum.

5. Natural Light

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From a family walk last week in the waning hours of the day.

Linking with Scavenger Hunt Sunday

Saturday Critters – Essence of Bear

Bear World Bear - Impressions - Soft Sketch 40 pct

This is a resident bear at Yellowstone Bear World in Rexburg, Idaho. I call the post “Essence of Bear” because I blended a drawing rendition of the original photograph with the photograph (at about a 20% drawing/80% original ratio) to bring out some of the features of the animal because the original photograph was like a silhouette of the bear with his muzzle.

Linking with Saturday Critters

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Weekend Reflections – Noir

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Son and I went on a walk around Tulsa’s Lafortune Park last week and as usual I took three cameras with me. A Nikon point and shoot, an Apple Ipod Touch, and my generic Android cell phone. I took this with my cell phone and then filtered the photo through an app on the phone with a “Noir” app that provided the ghostly reflections above.

It is kind of hard to see where photography is going, the cell phone apps are getting ever more sophisticated and both my point and shoot Nikon and my “big” Nikon have wifi capability where I can move photos from the cameras to either the Ipod or the cell phone for processing and posting. I’m really enjoying see how things are changing. I don’t know where they are going though.

So where are you on the App revolution? Do you use them or not?

Linking with Weekend Reflections

Digital Art Meme – A Vintage Chevy down the Street

Chevy Truck - Impressions Abstractions 56 pct

During an evening dog walk we found this 1960’s model Chevy pickup parked down the street from us. I had not seen it before and with Tennessee plates I don’t know if it is going to be here permanently or not. I think it is a beauty.

I used the Abstract I filter of Topaz Impressions backed off to 56 pct.

Linking with Digital Art Meme

Abandonment – II

Abandoned Gas Station

Monday, after work I took Logan to his voice lessons. The studio is in an old strip shopping center and I like to walk around rather than sit in the waiting space. Last week I featured a recently abandoned Shell Station at the center. Well guess what, there is another abandoned Gas Station a couple hundred yards south of the Shell Station. I think it has been boarded up ten years or so. I forget what chain had the site.

They left their old sign up and I always get a chuckle out of it.

Abandoned Gas Station Sign

Since the station went out of business the prices listed have sometimes seemed like a huge bargain or a big ripoff. Right now they are just a moderately good deal.

Linking with Signs, Signs

Wild Brew 2015

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Heather and I went downtown Saturday night to attend Wildbrew 2015, a beer tasting event benefitting The Sutton Center in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. The Sutton Center is a non-profit organization  dedicated to funding cooperative conservation solutions for birds and the natural world through science and education. They were instrumental in reestablishing bald eagles in Oklahoma. 

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The place was buzzing when we got there. There were lots and lots of  craft breweries represented and many of the restaurants in town were handling out samples (good size samples) of their food. Heather and I kind of alternated between the beer and the food. Plus the Midlife Crisis Band was playing.

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There were so many breweries represented that the lines never got long for any of them. And don’t worry, it was not a drunken brawl. We had little sample glasses. We’d sample it and then dump the rest to go try more. It was fun. Lots of unusual beers out that night.

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And the hipsters were out in force although I didn’t see any of the Hipster Nation’s favorite beer, Pabst Blue Ribbon. or “PBR” as the hipsters call it. The thing about hipsters is that not a one of them will admit to it. Sorry dudes, rolled up cuffs are a dead giveaway.

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One guy showed up in a kilt. Hey dude, wrong party!!! But stay and have a beer anyway.

Everybody had a great time. There was one attendee who was committed fully to the event.

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You know what I mean. This pig gave his all.

Scavenger Hunt Sundays – Rule of Thirds Edition

Ashley Sisk of Rambling and Photos provides five prompts every week for Scavenger Hunt Sunday. This week’s prompts and my interpretation are as follows:

1. Silly

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I love the sense of humor that went into this decoration of a VW I found downtown.

2. Spin

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I found this lady spinning wool at a local craft show. I asked if I could take a photo of her and she said to have at it. Spinning is quite an interesting process.

3. Four

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Four, four, whatever can I find for four. I know!!!! How about Four oil tanks at this well in located in the Colony Wash field in western Oklahoma.

4. Guilty Pleasure

#Geocaching in woods in the gap between the east and westbound lanes of the Broken Arrow Expressway in midtown #Tulsa this afternoon. Not one person in a thousand in Tulsa even knows about them. Great way to celebrate the #InternationalDayofGeocaching tod

My guilty pleasure is Geocaching. A sort of high tech treasure hunt where people hide “Caches” out in world and post the coordinates on the internet. And then other people go find them using their GPS receivers. I have been doing for over ten years and have all sorts of fun. There is a cache hidden between the two small trees above. The trees are located in the median of a freeway here in Tulsa. Geocaches are everywhere. I have found about 1300 of them, most of them in the Tulsa area. Check the link to find out more about it.

5. Rule of Thirds

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I took this photo of the sun setting down the street in front of the house. I tried to put the little dot of sun poking through the trees in the upper and left 1/3 of the photograph.

Linking with Scavenger Hunt Sunday

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Saturday Critters – Logan and Cisco

Logan Riding Cisco - Impressions - Cezanne I at 75 pct

This is Logan riding Cisco. Often Logan rides outside but it was raining today so Logan rode in the arena at All-star Therapy Group in Ramona, Oklahoma. Logan has been doing Therapeutic Horseback Riding there for some time. The folks that run the center really have a heart for their clients.

I ran this photo through Topaz Impressions with their “Cezanne I” filter and then faded it a little bit so it is about 75% filter and 25% original photo.

Linking with Saturday Critters.