Finally.............

Finally had some fun.

My friend Jim's 50th birthday bash.

Dancing to Talking Heads, Wild Wild Life.

This weekend get-away was much needed and it helped me alleviate my sadness.

At least for a bit, anyway.

Rainbow Bridge Welcomes Another Sweet Soul.

It is with great sadness that I am writing this post.

Eight days ago, I made the decision to relieve my Sasha of her suffering here on earth.

I have been overwhelmed with grief, and even though I know she's in a better place, I cannot stop feeling guilty. The guilt doesn't stem from making the wrong choice, but rather in thinking that I let her linger in pain for much too long. Even now, I know that she probably could have, would have lived another year. She was such a good dog.  This has been one of the worst weeks of my life.

There hasn't been one day since last Monday that I haven't cried.

This photo was taken just 30 minutes prior to the vet coming to the house.

I had been crying all day.

 Sasha was more than just a dog to me. You see, I never had kids of my own so I considered her my baby. 

It's always just been me, Justin and Sasha. Our little family.

Sasha's been to almost as many states as I have.

She's gone on every single vacation with us except for three.  

I have a foot locker full of photos and last night I spent a couple of hours going through them searching for pictures of a healthy, vibrant and happy Sasha.

There are so many stories I want to share because remembering those times makes me feel good.

But for now, I just want you all to know, that I will be back soon.

I just need a little time to mourn my loss.

And then I will bombard you with pictures of Sasha, like when she tried climbing a tree chasing a cat.

Summer Treat

Saturday, there was a gourmet food truck block party at the Sun Coast Hotel Casino.

There were about 25 different trucks, a couple of which were previously featured on the TV show, The Great Food Truck Race.

 It cost $5.00 to get into this event and all proceeds are to benefit the Special Olympics.

The food trucks got to keep their own profits.

It was a really super hot day on Saturday and seating was quite limited.

My friends and I walked around surveying all the trucks before deciding which food we wanted.

I chose to order from The Rusty Pickle.

The Rusty Pickle's menu is what attracted me.

Sliders were the main entre'.

Tri-tip sliders.

Pulled pork sliders.

Chicken sliders.

Instead of trying just one, I ordered a slider trio.

The tri-tip slider had the most flavor by far. The other two paled in comparison.

The real reason I orderd from this truck is becausee of the fried okra.

It cost $5.00 for an order of fried okra but it was worth it.

Fried okra is one of my favorite foods.

I spent a total of $13.00 at this truck.

Then I got really thirsty.

I didn't see any trucks that were selling fountain drinks with ice .

So the next best thing was shaved ice.

 This was really yummy.

I had a combination of two flavors: Wild Cherry and Blackberry.

It was a really large cup. I think about 32 ounces.

It took me a good 30-40 minutes to eat the whole thing

and my tongue was numb afterward.

My friends and I walked around a little more after devouring our shaved ice.

I snapped some more photos not even thinking about trying to get good pictures.

My only motivation was to record the event.

This is one of the trucks that was on the TV show last year.

If I remember correctly, I think they were in the top five or six when they left the show.

I was actually surprised at how many local trucks there were.

I had no idea.

The Rusty Pickle was local as well.

Another truck from The Great Food Truck Race.

Back to the title of my blog post.

Summer treat.

All day long we kept seeing these wonderful snowball treats.

They looked so refreshing and there were many flavors to choose from.

I don't know what this flavor is but there are weird little crystal looking things as a topper.

Anyhow, after my friends and I eyeballed every passerby who walked by with one of these pretty little treats, we decided we had  to have one.

So we go get in line and once we get to the window, we were told it would be a twenty minute wait.

What?

20 minutes for flavored ice?

Well, we were just too impatient and thirsty to wait that long for this lovely snowball.

So, we walked around the corner where we ordered shaved ice from another vendor.

That's where I got the wild cherry/blackberry flavored ice that took me 30-40 minutes to eat and was super uber delicious.

Well, after awhile, we were still eyeballing everyone with the pretty snowballs.

We still wanted one of those.

They looked so good.

Well, again we were told it would be a 20 minute wait.

Well, this time we decied to wait.

So, we put our order in and we waited in anticipation for this juicy delight.

I ordered a trio of flavors for my snowball: Pomegranate, Black Cherry and Lime.

That's what you see in the very first photo.

Ok, I'll give you a few seconds to scroll back up and refresh your memory.

Oh, you're back. Ok.

It looks pretty doesn't it?

Well, I have to say that after all that eyeballing, and all that craving of that pretty snowball,

it just didn't live up to it's beauty.

Nope. It was quite a disappointment.

It was much too sweet and I couldn't tell one flavor from another.

Of course, I finished the whole thing but my plane jane shaved ice I had earlier won my taste buds over and made an imprint in my heart. It was definitely the better ice.



Transit of Venus

Click on photo to enlarge

Did anyone else try to capture an image of the transit of Venus?

My image is a bit out of focus but if you look closely you can see the little black dot on the sun.  That is Venus.

I used the same home made filter that I used when I photographed the solar eclipse last month.

The thing I like most about going out with my camera is all the people I meet.  Yesterday was no exception.

This guy was the only person here besides my frend

when I first arrived. He wasn't a photographer or anything like that. He was just a guy out walking the trails in the desert.

His name is Mike and he was quite interesting to talk to.

The subjects of conversation covered everything from UFO's,

conspiracy theories, politics, spirits, and higher consciousness.

Like I said, he was very interesting to talk with.

He encouraged me to check out a website, Divine Cosmos. Which  I did just now. I only skimmed it though so I could provide a link for my fellow bloggers but i do intend on checking out the content to see what it's all about.

I snapped a photo of him with my phone before I left.

It's almost embarrassing that my shadow is in the picture, let alone the placement of my shadow. It was not done on purpose.

 My friend, Deyanira finding her focal point.

The guy in the white T-Shirt had a telescope attached to his camera and he was quite generous in sharing the view with us,

which looked totally awesome. The sun was red and you could see venus clearly as well as several sunspots.

I didn't catch his name but I caught his story.

He just arrived from Seattle, his home town.

Apparently he had set up his equipment earlier in the day so he could capture the image of venus transiting the sun and he couldn't see anything from his location. So what does he do? He packs his camera gear up, drives straight to the airport, catches a plane to Vegas, rents a car and drives straight out to where we were. He didn't pack anything else at all because he had to fly back the same day in order to be home to go to work the next morning.

Man, I wish I could do that.

The spontanaety of it all is so thrilling.

Of course I had to snap a photo of myself as well.

BLAH!

I was going to send it to a friend to show what I was doing but I changed my mind.

The wind was blowing pretty good and the weather was really nice.

The best part was meeting cool people and learning new things.

And opening my mind to subjects that don't usually come up in everyday conversation.



Chicken Shit Bingo And Other Good Stuff

Yesterday I went to the strip with with Justin, Gayla, Glenn and Milt.

I'll tell you more about that on another day.

 I only mention it because the above photo was taken during that time frame.

The above photo is a framed picture created from real flowers.

I spotted this beauty at the Bellagio.

But I only post it now as to prepare you for my next photo.

Last weekend Justin and I took a drive and ended up in Goodspirngs, NV.

We'd never been there before so we didn't know what to expect.

It's a small little town that consists of one little general store/gift shop and a saloon.

Nothing else except some houses.

Basically, it's a little shit hole out in the middle of the desert.

But, we were hot and thirsty so we decided to stop.

When we got out of the truck we heard loud music wafting through the air.

Music to my ears.

By golly, it was a live band.

Where there's music, I come to life.

So, we went inside the saloon, ordered a beer and took notice of our surroundings.

It was a cool place really and it was hopping with action.

I mean, who would have thought?

When the band took it's break, we walked outside to the courtyard to check things out.

This is what I saw.

This caught my attention so naturally I had to walk over there and get a closer look.

Plus, I have a habit of saying that word.

Here is the chickenshit bingo board.

They had it locked up in this white wooden cage, which is why you see the white stripes.

I don't know if they actually play this or if it is a gimmick

but it sure got a chuckle out of me.

While there we met and talked to some cool people.

That's a whole other story for another day.

Right now I want to tell you about other good stuff.

This may or  may not have more meaning to the Friday Town Shoot Out participants.

Ginger, who posts over at Flowers and More and I, have collaberated on a new project.

We started another blog which we call, Dance With Words. 

It is our goal to improve upon our writing skills while developing discipline.

Our concept is two perspectives, one post.

We choose a topic and we alternate writing within the same post.

 If I choose the topic she starts the first paragraph, then I write the 2nd paragraph, then she writes the 3rd paragraph and so on.

We've written a few entries so far and it's been enjoyable as well as challenging.

The are two posts regarding dreams.

These two posts are individuallly written.

I wrote, My Dream Word and she wrote Dreams.

I invite all of you to check it out, give some us feedback and/or follow us if you are so inclined.

It is more of a writing blog than a photo blog so I know you may not have the patience to read through our posts and that is fine too.

I just wanted to share this with all of my readers here.

I never in a million years would have thought that i would be co-writing a blog with a stranger let alone someone who lives in Brasil.

Dance With Words

Thank you!



FMTSO: The Use Of Space

Hello fellow bloggers.

 I'm participating in The Friday My Town Shoot Out and the theme this week is the use of space. 

 I wanted to get out and get some fresh pictures, but darn it, I just didn't have the time.

I hope the weekend is off to a good start for all of you.

 It certainly is for me.

  I think I'll take a little drive to go shooting somewhere once I get some laundry done.

 I know you all want me to shut up and get on with the pictures.

 Okay, okay, but be forewarned, you may have seen these before. 

 I know I have posted this next photo or one similar so please forgive me for the repeat.

In addition to lots of space for the trees to grow upward,

You are also looking into space.

These are small star trails I shot at Mt. Charleston last year.

Personally, I think star trails are boing to look at, but I also think it's kind of cool that you can capture the stars in a circular motion.

The above photo was taken early this year out at Techatticup.

We had several models to shoot.

As you can see, this model is running towards the photographers.

She has lots of space to move forward.

That's all I've got for this week.

My dog is driving me crazy so I can't do what I want right now.

Gotta take care of my elderly, can't harldy hold herself up baby dog.

I'll check out all the blogs this weekend.