I thought I would start the new year off right, so here is one of my favorite pictures. The picture felt appropriate given that most of the country is shrouded in winter. We just got back from Minnesota yesterday. It was interesting seeing the change in climate. When I left San Jose it was 60 degrees.. and when I arrived in Minneapolis it was a whopping -23 degrees with the wind chill. I snapped this shot while on a train going back to Spokane a few years back. Even though I love the picture it didn't quite capture the magic of the moment.. the hill was practically glowing when I took it. Happy New Year Everyone!

Another shot on the way back. We were near a town called Gilroy, CA which smelled intensely of garlic.

The return trip to Spokane was relaxing and easy. The sleeper car was really nice, if small. The privacy was much appreciated. The whole day of traveling that these pictures are from was suprisingly quite. Unfortunately the sun set before we had reached the mountains of Montana.

Ah, figured out how to get images to my server from here. So here are a couple of images showing the contrast between the West and East sides of Montana.

Passing by the scenery at 80 miles an hour is a lesson in camera control. : )

Telephone poles trailing off into the distance on Chamness trail (in Illinois) this summer.

Sunrise through some weeds outside of work this morning.

The country sure is beautiful in this area. I took this picture just north of where I work back a couple of months ago when the wheat fields were golden. Summer is gone. I don't feel like I took as much advantage of the area as I could of. I had hoped to get out a bunch.

Ah well... no use having regrets. I am looking forward to winter (but not the cold). Nice thing about the area is that it doesn't go totally grey. I noticed last winter when I took that train ride to visit my brother Chris and his family, how much of a contrast there was between the evergreen country and the grey Minnesota and Illinois areas. I am hoping to get a bunch of snowy landscape pics and the like.

Haven't been taking that many pictures over the past month. The weather has been very bland. I missed the week or so of leaves turning. It was colorful and beautiful, but I just didn't feel the urge to pull out the camera.

Starting to feel like taking pictures again. I am waiting for a good opportunity and some good light. I am back to carrying my camera with me everywhere. Feels good to do that... though I think it hovers that border of being a dedicated artist and a male tourist type fellow (ie gadget man). I try to keep it simple. Sometimes I wonder why I didn't study photography exclusively when I was in college. I took a lot of photography classes and spent a ton of time in the dark rooms. I love it so much. Its about being out there and in it. It my two favorite things rolled into one, hiking and art.

I want to get used to shooting people more and not just landscapes. I need to get more comfortable with it. Living in a inner city for years, I got in the habit of not being overly friendly to people on the street and avoiding too much contact. I think to get into doing street photography, I would have to gain back some of that small town mentality I grew up with.