Jasonisms

Denver, from Rocky Mountain Wildlife Refuge . This was only the second time I have ever been to the park and not seen a bison or two within fifty feet of me. In this image you can see Dick's Sporting Goods Park , then the Commerce City municipal building and, in the distance, the Denver skyline. The right half of the image is mostly industrial buildings popping up through the trees.

Oh good, he lost an entire vacation day over this. Good thing the horse was okay. Oh wait, he wasn't. #DPD #Denver #Horse #Equestrian https://www.google.com/amp/www.9news.com/amp/news/local/dpd-officer-forgot-his-mounted-patrol-horse-left-animal-tied-up-for-16-hours/384518805

Still walking around #Denver. My feet hurt. Taken with Android and edited with Snapseed​.

This made national news for a few minutes back in January. Here's an update, of you care. #motorcycle #Denver http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/local-news/no-criminal-charges-in-deadly-shooting-at-colorado-motorcycle-expo

Below is an email I had to send to the senior librarian for the Denver public library system. It's long and not worth the read, but it needed to be said. Shirley,  I regret to say this email is not being sent as acknowledgement for superior service or as a compliment in other areas. This email finds you as a complaint of experiences I've had at the Hampden Branch over the recent past. First, allow me to describe myself. I am an avid fan, and user, of the library system here in Denver. A member since the early 2000s, I have used the library nearly exclusively for books, movies and magazines for the past eight years. I visit the Hampden Branch approximately once a week, sometimes more depending on my schedule and have been known to spend time at University-Hills, Montbello, Smiley, Park Hill and Central as well. When I need to be have a nice quiet place to work I find a nearby library in lieu of a coffee shop for other restaurant. Since it's close to home, I usually ...

I know I've been neglecting this blog for a month or more and there's no one to blame but myself. Not only have I been very busy, but I've also had, and recovered from, a cold as well as ending up on some sort of weird sleep cycle where I'm tired all day, sleeping all night and tired again the next day. To be honest, I think it's the cold that upset my sleep cycle. Last night seemed to be the first night in weeks where I slept through the entire night and woke up feeling refreshed. Anywho, about a week ago it snowed in Denver (again). I mean, it's winter and snow isn't uncommon during this time of year. Naturally, I took Rufus to the dog park. He loves the snow and has a blast running around in the icy cold goodness. I think he agrees with the cooler weather and the snow just makes everything smell new and wonderful. Could you imaging being a dog? Science says they're sense of smell is hundreds or thousands of times more sensitive than a human being...

On the Friday after Thankgiving The Denver Public Library's City Life organized a brief bell concert with the Castle Rock Ringers, a volunteer bell choir out of Caste Rock, Colorado. Instead of fighting with Black Friday shoppers I decided to drag my laptop on down to the library, get some writing done, and listen to the bells with their renditions of traditional (Christmas) holiday music. The view from my perch wasn't ideal, but other's had taken up better seats on the second balcony. As it worked out, I ended up talking with the wife of the conductor for the better part of the concert.  The below video was taken by my Note II with no additional microphones or tuning. I only took video of the one song to provide an example of the music from that evening. And while I will never encourage people to visit Facebook, this is their Facebook Page  which seems to their only web presence for more information.  Or Click This Link

Zombie Girl with a Flower There's a not-so secret in Denver, Colorado. Every year, for one day only, a feral outbreak hits the city, spreading a plague of the undead across the Mile High City, specifically along the 16th Street Mall and Skyline Park. For eight years now, the EyeHeartBrains.com zombie crawl has traversed the core of downtown Denver, bringing record breaking numbers of zombies to the city and leaving blood and bloody carcasses in it's wake. Zombies of all shapes and sizes, ages and backgrounds crawled along the walking outdoor mall and where there are zombies there are zombie hunters, survivalists and, yes, looky-loos. I, once again, was one of those looky-loos. Camera in hand -- this is a photography blog after all -- I buttoned up my courage and drove downtown to the heart of the outbreak. As it turns out, there's a zombie for just about everything: zombie Star Wars characters, zombie Jesus', zombie fishermen and a plethora of zombie nurses.  Below a...

Checking the Price Online   A few days ago the front wheel (driver's side) of my truck started making a hideous grinding noise . Since I never actually heard the squeak of the brake pad indicator being low, I assumed a rock or a twig or something somehow became caught in between the brake pad and rotor. A quick visual inspection showed nothing out of the ordinary on the brake, caliper or rotor. When it didn't go away after a couple of days I finally headed over to a friend's house to pull the tire and check since my Home Owner's Association does not allow auto-maintenance on the property. By this time I was terrified the caliper was hanging off or the brake pads had ground themselves off, even though I still never heard the squeal of the low pad indicator. Luckily, that particular morning, Google Offers came out with an offer for Advanced Auto Parts . The offer was for $10 off a purchase of $50 or more. Great, I thought! I jumped online and checked prices. B...

The Blogger mobile app is great, but when creating a blog post from an image in the Android image gallery, the blog the image is supposed to be posted to cannot be changed; it can be changed from the Blogger app only.  This post was supposed to go to my photography blog but ended up here instead because of that little quirk, so I hope you enjoy looking at these images. I took some pictures of Denver's cityscape from the 7th floor of the Denver library. These are Android (Note II) shots and edited with Snapseed. The Denver Skyline Across Civic Center Park, in Black and White-ish The below image was only slightly boosted with some saturation to bring out the greens of the grass and the blueish grey tones in the sky. The above image is the same as this one but with a more dramatic treatment. Denver Skyline Across Civic Center Park, in color The next two images are the same, as well. Both are of the Denver City/County building, with Civic Center Park ...

Had a chance to grab a couple of (android) shots of the Denver skyline. The images were edited with Snapseed and then two of them -- one of each -- were given some extra treatment. You know, for fun. Unfortunately,  I didn't know we were going to be allowed on the 7th floor garden terrace or I would have brought my tripod and Pentax.

For the past 14 years my motorcycle club has ridden in the Denver St. Patrick's Day parade. These are some of the Android shots I took today. There are many more dSLR shots to come, but these were quick and easy to edit using Snapseed.

Click for Album A couple of weeks ago I took Rufus (my dog) down to a park here in Denver. It's a park I've only been to a handful of times in my more than a decade living in Denver. Not that it's a bad park, it's just not that close to me and I have to pass by a dozen other parks to get to this particular one. In my spare time, I'm trying to write a novel. My protagonist lives near this park and I needed to know more about it, so I grabbed my camera and walked around, taking pictures of the park, the area around it and Rufus. Why? Because I'm a photographer in my own mind and we always take our cameras with us. The light on this particular day was great, diffused by the clouds perfectly. A lot of the images I took were just pictures of the area so I didn't have to rush down there every time my character walked through the park, but I did get a handful I don't feel too bad sharing. You can click on the collage above or the slideshow below for all the ima...

On December 24th, 2012, for the second time since moving to Colorado I went to the Denver Botanic Gardens  for their Blossoms of Lights event. The first time, with an ex-girlfriend, happened a few years ago and neither of us brought a camera. To be honest, she wasn't entirely thrilled with my desire to photograph my life and I carried the camera (my trusty Pentax *IST DS) rarely. This time, however, I went for their Blossoms of Lights  showcase alone, with the specific intent to bring my camera and tripod, so I could take my time and work on my schedule, not having to worry about someone else's concerns. I chose Christmas Eve thinking most people would be home with the families, preparing for the December 25th festivities.  I was wrong. Apparently, December 25 is a very busy evening for the Gardens. I was surprised at the number of people there and getting shots without  people turned out to be very difficult.  With the overcast skies and the lights from th...

Test post from mobile to blogger, ala Instagram.

Testing uploading images from Android to Blogger.

I had to make  library run today to return a few items and pick up a few that were being held "On Hold" for me. I currently had 11 items out: 10 DVDs (or the maximum allowed out at once) and one music CD I mistakenly ordered On Hold. Unfortunately, over the week I barely had time to watch all the DVDs and took most of them back unwatched, intending to re-check the ones I didn't get a chance to see.  When I arrived I placed the returning items in the RETURNS drop box and went to the HOLDs shelf to get the new items waiting for me. I then took the remaining un-returned items and new hold shelf items to the checkout stand and explained I'd like to re-check batch one and check out for the first time, this other batch. For the most part it was fairly straight forward. Until ... The lady behind the counter told me I had a $5 fine.  Um, what? What was so late that I incurred a fine much less a $5 one? She then goes on to explain how, sometime a few mont...

About a month ago a friend of mine, who lives in Las Vegas, was hired to escort some dogs to Denver for their owner. Of course she immediately sent out a notification to those of us in Denver letting us know when she would be here and for how long. Essentially, Friday through Sunday. Well, from what I understand, arriving Friday, delivering the dogs to their owner and leaving sometime Sunday. Seeing as how I have a very flexible schedule right now I told her I could hang out Friday afternoon after she's completed her delivery. I also happen to know the brewmasters at a local brewery and I thought it would be a fun "Denver" specific thing to do while she was here. Neither one of us are swimming in extra money and a chance to drink for free and especially a chance to drink at a brewery before the beer even reached a keg or a bar isn't something everyone has a chance to do when they come to Denver. In other words, it's a cool insider thing to do when people come to...

I went to the library (because, I do that sort of thing) to pick up an item I had placed on hold. It wasn't anything special, just a CD of pop-music. As I park and walk up to the front doors I see a woman holding a clipboard. Great, I thought, someone taking a poll or trying to save the Earth. DOn't get me wrong, I'm not opposed to saving the Earth, I just don't have any money and they all seem to want donations in the form of cash, credit or check and not in the form of time, experience or skill-set. I walk up -- she's looking at me and I'm looking at her. "Are you registered to vote," she asks. Yes, I am actually. Well, I'm not sure, to be honest, I didn't vote in the mid-term election last year because I wasn't in town and I think Colorado has a program where if you don't vote they take you off the rolls. Just to be safe, she advises, let's fill out another voter registration form. Okay. Then she proceeds to treat me like...