52 Weeks 2012 February

Sunset on the Platform-Week 5 2012

 

 

Will You...? Week 6 2012

Light Up My Life With Love- Week 7 2012

Happy Birthday! Week 8 2012

52 Weeks in a Nutshell-January

The first month of my 52 Weeks photo project of 2012

2012 started with the arrival of Danbo, who came all the way from Japan to be a part of my 52 week project.

Week 2 was a visit to a local park. I never knew that this little jem was so close to the house I grew up in!

Joining the Dallas Photography group on meetup.com was quite helpful in getting out to new places and learning from several great photographers. This shot is from downtown Grapevine.

At the end of Jan, we welcomed in the Year of the Dragon.

Under Construction

Under construction...is the best way to describe the past year, and why I have been MIA to this blog. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Just about a year ago (Jan 14 to be exact) I posted this post about my new years resolutions. In a nutshell they were:

• Regain control of my life
• Travel more
• Improve my photography skills

I happily report that I accomplished all of these things. New job=happier me, I have also seen several new places in this year including my first trip to Canada, and visiting the southern most tip of the US (in HI). I also vowed to complete a 52 week photo project as well which was a fun learning experience. I will start to post the images of the project in an attempt to get caught up to my new 2013 project that starts this week!

So, on this eve of New Years Eve, as I reflect back on this year, I can honestly say that I am a much happier and healthier person than I was 366 days ago. and my goal for 2013 is to be able to say that same thing again at the end of next year. I hope the same for you :)

When All Else Fails, Follow a Dog

While in Capri, we decided to stroll through Anacapri and do a quick hike to some roman ruins. I had bought a great book with hikes for all over Italy,and felt that it had fairly detailed info of each hike. This hike/walk started at the center of town and would wind through the streets of Anacapri taking us out of town and to the ruins. Easy peasy. It was a nice hike and somewhere along the way we came across a friendly dog, who after a few pats on the head, he continued on his way up the path. One thing we didn't plan on was that many streets would not be marked and that we would get lost. As the six of us tried to decipher where we were on the map, the friendly dog came back and started barking at us. As a joke I said that maybe the dog was trying to tell us something, and he probably knows the city better than we do. But we realized that this dog was always about 20 yards ahead of us and he seemed like he knew where he was going.

So, we decided that we would just follow the dog instead, and see where he would take us. Patches, as we named him led us left and right down cobblestone streets, and past old homes with grapevines and wisteria growing in the yards. Then we turned out of the city and onto a path lined with tall pines. As we continued through the piney trail, low and behold, Patches actually led us to the ruins we were looking for, Villa Damecuta! We think he is a stray that lives on the grounds since there is running water there (and he appeared to be quite the mouser). After checking out the place, Patches followed us to the closest bus stop and waited with us. I felt bad because I think he felt the proper payment for his tour services was a forever home, but unfortunately, we couldn't take him with us back to the US. As the bus pulled up, as if on que, he went on his way, perhaps to look for the next group of lost touristas.

Our tour guide Patches taking in the view of the Gulf of Naples

New Year, New Resolutions

Cheers to a New Year and another chance to get it right! ~Oprah

 

I can honestly say I am happy to see 2011 go. It started out so well, but then around the end of summer it all went to hell. So I welcome 2012 as an opportunity to try to let go of the past and greet this new year with fresh eyes and a positive outlook...


That being said, I have made a few New Years resolutions to try to make 2012 a better one. Perhaps by posting them here, I will hold myself accountable to them. So, in no particular order here they are:

1. I will regain control over my life. I have had zero balance to my life for the past six months, all work and no play makes me pretty cranky. This includes finding time for myself to do the things I enjoy, finding time to cook real meals, and keeping my house clean and organized (which may mean I hire a cleaning lady).
2. I will travel more. Even if I can't spend weeks in Europe, I will use the four weeks of vacation I get yearly and vow to not spend it at home. So far I have two trips in the works, so... so far so good.
3. I will take more photos and improve my photography skills. I was inspired by photographer Teresa Berg, who takes beautiful portraits of rescue dogs to help them find homes, and I would love to be able to do this for local rescues too. I love dogs and I love photography, this seems win/win. So I am working on my portrait skills and in the mean time have also decided to do a 52 week project. Here are week one and two:

Week 1 Danbo's Arrival

Week 2 Prairie Creek Falls

So there it is, I think these are achievable goals that will allow me to get 2012 right. What are your goals for this year?

FTW-Best Out of Office Message

You are packed and ready to go on vacation, just a few small details left to take care of, confirm reservations, download some movies to your iPad, oh, and put your out of office message up on your email. Who hasn't been on vacation and neurotically checked work email? Part of me wants to read and respond, but I don't want to set some level of expectation that I will always do that. At my office, everything is always urgent, and many people act as if the information they need will in fact cure cancer, and that it is imperative we respond. Not to make light of our very fast paced office, but we aren't saving lives for sure! So how do you tell people that while I am sure whatever you need is SUPER important, most things are not as important as some hard earned time off with my family?
Well the good people at Gizmodo have posted the best out of office email I have ever seen, written by Josh Kopelman, and maybe one day I will have enough guts to try something similar at my office!

It reads:

I am currently out of the office on vacation.

I know I'm supposed to say that I'll have limited access to email and won't be able to respond until I return - but that's not true. My blackberry will be with me and I can respond if I need to. And I recognize that I'll probably need to interrupt my vacation from time to time to deal with something urgent.

That said, I promised my wife that I am going to try to disconnect, get away and enjoy our vacation as much as possible. So, I'm going to experiment with something new. I'm going to leave the decision in your hands:

• If your email truly is urgent and you need a response while I'm on vacation, please resend it to interruptyourvacation@firstround.com and I'll try to respond to it promptly.

• If you think someone else at First Round Capital might be able to help you, feel free to email my assistant, Fiona (fiona@firstround.com) and she'll try to point you in the right direction.

Otherwise, I'll respond when I return…

I love that he makes sure that they know they will be interrupting his vacation, that his wife will be mad, and that they should feel bad about it. But if after all that you really need that answer, go ahead and email him. I wonder how many emails he received to his interruptyourvacation email address?

Ryan Air Anyone?

I have heard so many stories about Ryan Air and other budget airlines. Lets start with Ryan Air it is a budget airline, and you should expect to get what you pay for. But if what you are paying for is just to get from point A to Point B no frills needed, then you are in business! If what you think you are paying for is top notch service and extras than you should look at Virgin Air.

My favorite Ryan Air story comes from a co-worker. You see the airline does not assign seating, so first on the plane gets the best seat. And they board everyone at once (with one exception) and from both ends of the plane. So his story goes like this: Everyone gets checked in, and gathers outside the gate on the tarmac. An attendant unhooks the stantion, and everyone starts hauling ass to the airplane. No holds bars mad dash to the plane, children and elderly be damned, everyone for themselves kind of thing. I think-"well that just adds to the experience!". If you have a Ryan Air (or other budget airline) story, please share it in the comments-I'd love to hear it!

Let me tell you something...when Italians are confused and start asking you questions about how the airline works and if they are in the correct line, you should be concerned. When tell them in your best Italian (which is horrid) that you are in line for flight 1234 and hope you are correct and they take your advice-worry more. Low and behold my sucky Italian actually got me in the correct line, but not before I creeped up on other passengers to sneak a peek at their boarding passes just to be sure. And that one exception I mentioned before? For like 5 euros you can get priority boarding, which to me seems worth it, but at a 70% increase to my 7 euro ticket, I guess it is kinda steep. At the end of the saga (yeah, there were delays) my 5 extra euros got us all exit row seats, for far less than what American charges. And since our flight was just over an hour, it was all worth it. If you are flying a short flight and don't care about frills, I would highly suggest trying Ryan, if you are in for a long haul, I would seriously weigh comfort vs price, because sometimes, the extra $200 is well worth it.