Last Ride on the Aprilia

Well, today being Halloween, we thought it prudent to take my bike off the street so it wouldn't get egg'd or TP'd or pranked in some other way. It gave us a good deadline for putting it up for sale and cleaning the bike stuff out of the garage. We've been waiting for a nice day to get a few pictures on the bike before selling it and even though we had a cold day today, my good friend Rodrick agreed to help shoot some super-cool shots of my last ride so I'd at least have some cool memories and pictures of the bike.

This is my favorite corner, 2 miles from home.
I love the motion blur and action in this photo.

The Aprilia has a 1:5 power-to-weight ratio. Lots of torque!

This isn't a view that many people see for long. =)

Thanks for the great pictures, Rodrick! Can't wait to enlarge a few and hang them in the house. Or the garage, at least! =)

Goodbye Li'l Red

Well, a doctor in Norman, OK is the new happy owner of my '97 Miata AKA Li'l Red. I didn't realize how many cool little things I'd done to it until I had to explain everything to the new owner. I hope I don't miss her too much.

Going to get some pictures on the Aprilia tomorrow morning and then run it down to Guy's shop to sell it, too. All the pricey toys are going. I'm a responsible adult now. Baby #2 is on the way and it's time to knuckle down and put in some hard time doing my best to provide for a family. There'll be lots of other fun things besides vehicles to look forward to and enjoy.

Guy did a great job selling the car for me. The cost of his commission was easily paid for by the totally stress-free negotiation and transaction for me. He took care of all of the paperwork and dealing with the buyer and I'd highly recommend him to broker/sell your car if you have one to sell in the OKC area. I'm sure he got more for it than I'd have got on my own.

Anyway, that's the skinny on today.

Beauty is Deceitful

Wow... I'm still a bit stunned from what I just saw. I love time-lapsed transformations, but I've never seen anything like this. And what a powerful message.

Sean's Blog

It's my pleasure to announce that my brother, Sean, has a blog! If you know Sean, or, for you ladies out there who would like to know Sean, check out flibbydibby.blogspot.com. "Why 'Flibby Dibby'?" you ask? I believe that's his intimidating, long-time player-name for Xbox and internet cafe chess... Or, it could just be one of those fun, meaningless expressions that come out at random times when you hang with Sean and he gets excited about something. Either way, it's not your place to question.

Sheesh! Lighten up, people! =)

Car and Worm Update

Never before have so many cars been owned by so few. Well, okay, that's probably not true, but it's true for us. We have three vehicles officially for sale now! The red Miata, the red Explorer and the red Aprilia!

Yesterday, I helped Holly's aunt Dixie pick up her new Ford Freestyle and finally really decided to buy her older Explorer from her instead of letting her trade it in. We paid her the same as she would have been paid trading it in, so it didn't put her out at all but it was a pretty good deal for us. It's the nicest and most expensive car we've ever owned, so we really thought long and hard before spending that much money. The fact that it's quite a bit safer than the '99 Explorer that Holly currently drives was pretty much the deciding factor.

Here's a picture of our newest "fleet" member. Welcome, big blue! It sure drives nice!

Oh, and here's the update on the worm picture I took the other day in my "Rain-inspired photography" blog. Sorry about that.

Rain-Inspired Photography

Here are a few pictures I took in the rain while I was waiting to head out to the wedding we photographed yesterday. I love the unusual effect rain has on pictures. One of these days, we're going to do a photo session in the rain just for the fun of it. =)

Click on these pictures to see more detail in the larger versions.



Okay, I'll bet these seem kind of random. The macro shots of the grass and flower because of the rain droplets clinging to both. The narrow depth of field is always cool on macros, too, and with the blowing wind, it was actually a bit of a challenge to capture the image at just the right moment when it was focused how I wanted it to be.

The crippled worm was my mistake. Stepped on the poor guy when I backed up from shooting the flower and grass. You know how smells can transport you back to a distant time and place? Well, dying worms give a very faint smell that can instantly take me back to riding a school bus through the rain back in high-school. Don't ask me how to describe the smell... My family is strange about smells. I have an aunt who can smell ants. I can smell snakes and dying worms. My mom can smell mold from like 36 miles away. All on the Ferreira side of the family, I might add. =)


And finally, the brick shot I like because it's high-contrast. I used an infra-red filter on this one to get the effect it has. I just thought it looks cool. I have it in a big enough picture that it's now one of my favorite desk top wall-papers. My Mac changes wall-papers every 15 minutes or so and is rotating through some cool black and white photos that I've been collecting.

Rain

We're enjoying a really nice steady rain today! Started around 3AM and it's still going.


As a kid, I really didn't like rain. It cramped my outdoors style and seemed like we always got more than we needed. I rarely saw neighbors watering their lawns.

Holly absolutely loves rain. Living in Oklahoma, you learn to really appreciate it when it rains. I think we had 3 months of basically no rain (just a trace) this summer with temps in the 100's for most of that time. Unless you water every day that's over 100 degrees, your grass turns yellow or brown and starts to shrivel up just to save the roots.

It's such a nice feeling to be sipping a hot cuppa in my leather chair, typing on a Mac notebook and being warm and dry. Ah the simple contentments of life!

The Aussie Room

I don't think we've told everyone about our study/studio/office yet. Well, we've probably told almost everyone, but didn't include cool pictures yet. So, here's one. Actually, I put a few up on our Prints Charming Photography blog, so if you haven't seen them, click on the link to that blog on the right hand side of this page and then check out the entry called "Where the Magic Happens."


Holly is not going to be thrilled with this picture since she's 6 months' pregnant, has a growing headache and was ready to go to bed about 2 hrs ago so you'd better cut her some slack or she'll make me yank this picture. Sheesh, people! How about a little discretion and consideration! =)

Okay, there are a couple of cool things in this picture that should be pointed out. First is the skin on the back of the chair Holly is sitting in. It's a kangaroo skin and every single chair in that entire room has one just like it. Okay, so that's only two chairs, but I'm willing to bet that most of you don't have even one.

Second, the alligator skin on the wall. Ignore that walnut-sized hole where the back legs and tail meet. Holly's grandfather shot that gator somewhere in Louisianna and had the foresight to save it for our Australia-themed room. It came with two or three little baby gator skins, too. Not sure what foresight included those, or how they were "harvested" so we didn't display them. I believe they're in North Carolina now, actually, at Aunt Jonnie's.

Okay, third is the sweet leather chair with ottoman that you can't see. Some of y'all might remember the gray leather couches I was given in Chicago by a friend who lives downtown. I think they were like 20 years old when I got them and I've had them for 6 or 7 years. Well, they're well worn in, but still holding up remarkably well. That's pretty much sold us on leather furniture and so when we needed a club chair for our study, we found a deal on this one and gave it a loving home. It's been great and we're now looking/hoping for a couch, love-seat, chair deal for our living room to replace the 70's couches we have currently. Our old couches will make a really great addition to either Guy's garage (Shepherd Automotive) or a college hangout room at church or something like that.

Fourth, there's probably not a need to mention the PowerBook G4 notebook on Holly's lap. Titus and Benjamin now have one and I'm doing my best to talk my parents into getting a Mac so we can video chat. Not sure why we're having trouble, but they can't seem to connect with us over AIM video chat and iChat. They would just LOVE to see Addie over that video chat and it would be so easy to talk with them every day like that. Oh well... Hopefully the'll get it figured out.

I guess that's about it. I need to get some things done. Until next time...

Thanks for reading!

Red River Rivalry continued...

Okay, here's how serious the UT fans are...

On a bumper sticker seen in Texas near the stadium last weekend: "Bob Stoops hates puppies and Jesus."

(Mom, Bob Stoops is the head coach of the OU football team. And he really does love Jesus, of course.)

Wow, that's just plain mean and dirty down here in the Bible belt.

The Red River Rivalry (OU-Texas)

Unless you've lived here, you may not understand how big a deal the Red River Rivalry is every year. The Red River is more or less the border between much of Oklahoma and Texas and every year UT come up from Austin, TX and OU goes down from Norman, OK to fight it out during the Texas State Fair. This year was the 101st year of the rivalry and I saw no lack of enthusiasm from either side.

To make a painful story short, OU lost and I heard today from a friend who works in the Emergency Room about one really great related story.

One OU fan, clad in his OU pajamas, showed up at the Emergency Room on Saturday evening shortly after the game. He drove himself there with a very seriously bleeding hand. He told the attending staff that he was so upset about the game that he punched right through his TV. That's right. My friend (the Dr.) said it looked like he had filleted his hand! He had lost so much blood that they had to give him blood and take him into emergency surgery to put it all back together.

Man, some people really take this game seriously. This guy could have easily got local TV news coverage over it. Maybe he was embarrassed after the fact. Or too sedated. =

Mom & Dad Sangree are going to be selling their home in PA soon. I keep telling them they could buy an RV and travel a little before building their next home. Sean is in CA now, practicing law, so they could drive to OK, then on to CA, then back. Holly and I found this beauty on wheels the other day and we both immediately thought of my parents. I think it would look so fitting on old Route 66, all the way to SoCal!

Hot Mama

A day or two ago, we showed up downtown 30 minutes too early for a shoot, so we decided to take the opportunity to shoot a few pictures of each other. It's been a long time since we took pictures of each other and it was a lot of fun. Thought you might enjoy seeing a few.

I should say as a disclaimer that we haven't retouched these pictures in Photoshop at all, just uploaded them for friends and family! Holly is almost 6 months pregnant in these... Doesn't she look amazing?

Thanks for reading!

Buying a Camera

Well, you'd think that since we're photographers buying a camera would be an easy thing. =) Not the case, at all. Ever since Addie was born 2 years ago, Holly especially has been wishing we had a video camera. I wish we had a simple point-and-shoot camera. The answer? One that will do both: The Canon SD800 IS. =)

You might feel like you're reading the script from a TV commercial, but that's how passionate we are about cameras! I did a bit of research today and I think that's the one we want to go with. We'll have to do a little bit of shopping and "holding" the cameras, I'm sure, but just looking at the specs and features, I like this camera. It can shoot video at up to 60 fps, so even though video will not be it's strongest point, it will be adequate for our primary video need: Sharing cute clips online with out-of-town family.

You might be asking yourself, "Why has it taken 2 years to make this decision?" Well, mainly because I didn't want to make a quick decision. =) I really didn't want to buy a video camera that would just amass hundreds of old tapes for us that we'd never have time to watch. With this new camera, we should be able to put the video clips on DVD and watch them either on the computer directly or with a DVD player on TV. I've seen my brother's camera take some really amazing video and so I'm pretty confident that we'll be in good shape. Plus, we have Mac's so we can make cool movies/videos in iMovie, right? We'll have to try that out sometime and post some for you to check out.

Thanks for reading!

Punk Senior Pictures

If you haven't seen our Prints Charming Photography blog in a couple of days, check it out. We did senior pictures for Grant, a very cool kid with a mohawk and punk style! It was really an eye-opening experience for us and we got some really cool pictures to capture the moments...

Here's one of my favorites:

Check the rest our blog about it here and follow the link to the rest of the proofs if you like.

Thanks for reading!

October and All's Well

Can you believe it's already October? The 10th month of the year 2006? Amazing... Time is really flying. I have a theory about why time goes faster the older you get: Time moves at a rate relative to how long you've already lived. It's like a ratio. When you're 10, one year is a long time because it's 1/10th of your life. By the time you're 30, a year is only 1/30th of your life, so it's a much shorter time-frame, relatively speaking. Oh, and I have an analogy about it, too. It's like a tethered rope swinging around a pole, wrapping itself up until it's completely wrapped around the pole. The first few revolutions (like years) take the longest, but as the rope shortens, the revolutions pick up speed and the RPMs increase significantly. There you go... Deep thoughts, by Christian Sangree. =)

We had a great weekend. Holly's birthday was Thursday the 28th and she turned 29 for the 2nd time. =) I worked from home all day to spend the day with her and we had a great time. We decided to make Friday the big date night for her birthday and we went out to eat at Carrabba's and then out to the movies to see "The Guardian." I didn't realize the Coast Guard was so heroic. I have friends in the Coast Guard and have a new respect for what they do. When the Navy and others come in to harbor to escape hurricanes and storms, the Coast Guard heads out to save lives. We really enjoyed the movie. Hooray for grandparents who live nearby and love to have Addie over for the night!

Then, after the movie, we went to a grand opening at a friend's photography studio (qmyersstudios.com). He does some really amazing fashion and modeling photography. Nothing like what we do, but he's good at what he does. We went to support him and his new venture and were really impressed at his cool old place that he's made into a really hip studio.

After all that, I had to get up at like 6AM to market for Senior Care at a fundraiser walk downtown to help fight Alzheimer's. Grabbed a nice nap after that and then headed to Stillwater to photograph a wedding up there on the OSU campus. Wow, what a great campus for a wedding! It was beautiful weather and the couple was great to work with.

The only problems we had were with the three videographers who were like papparazi! Man, we could hardly get a shot without them setting up right in front of us or leaning a shoulder in our picture. It was really ridiculous and we even heard guests complaining because they were in front of everyone all the time, blocking the best views of everything. Rod and I felt so bad that we shot from our knees whenever we could to try to make some room for people to see what was going on. If you know anyone who's going to be married soon, they should really tell the videographers to take a back seat and not get in everyone's way, especially the photographers! People typically spend four times as much on photography than they do on videography, so you'd think the videographers would get the hint about priorities... Ah well. They left before we did and finally felt unencumbered to roam about and get some really great shots. Rod should have several up soon on his blog to give a little taste of what we did.