Blazer Camp

Friday night Malcolm and I went camping with his Blazer Patrol at Sanders Nature Preserve, a few miles west of home. It's not rained here for at least a week yet the 1-1/2 mile hike in was still pretty mucky. At night we did some flashlight painting. For the last picture we put Dallas on the stump and told him to hold still for one minute ... one boy painted around him from behind, got out of the way, then we all painted him for several seconds with our flashlights from the front.

Sanders Preserve

Leaves are just beginning to come out on trees at the Sanders Nature Preserve where we went camping Friday and Saturday. We hiked along a stream and found the most interesting stuff, including a newt.

Wii Will Rock You

Joanie set it on the mail table so Malcolm would see it when he got off the school bus. I heard him yell "Yes!" when he walked in the door. He's been saving his money for months and it finally paid off. This explains the Wii Remote and Nunchuk I got for my birthday.

Fruitsnack

Our younger kids are addicted to those little packets of fruit snacks. Carter likes the ones with the Batman theme. And it's spoken around here as one word: "fruitsnack."

Growth

Things are finally getting beautiful again. It started last week with little slivers of green sliding up through the dead ground scrub. Suddenly today there are trees everywhere covered with blooms and flowers. This is a close shot of a silver maple bloom, playing around with my fast f/1.8 lens in the back yard last night. This glass does something dreamy and psychedelic with the light — I love this shot with the little diffusion halos around the stems and blossoms. Pretty soon we'll be sweeping up millions of helicopter seed pods these trees will release all over the back deck.

Homework

Carter's just started a weekly pre-school class being taught by the kids in the high school child development course. Tomorrow is his next class so he was doing his homework tonight. Check out how well he stays in the lines — I had no idea he could do that — he's super-focused when he colors. He's the next up-and-coming artist in the family.

Claire's Day at the Playground

Claire's greatest desire in life suddenly is to go outdoors. I was out on the deck today putting together our new grill ... I looked back at the sliding door and there is Claire pressed against the screen watching me and holding up one of her shoes. Re: the sandbox photos, I find I let my kids do things I wouldn't normally if I have a camera in my hand. The kids had a bath when they got home — each successive layer of Claire's clothing held even more sand than the layer before.

Carter's Day at the Playground

This week is Spring Break, so I took the week off, and as it turns out it's been the first week of beautiful weather here. We've been outside playing every day. Today we met some friends at the park and got all hot and tired. Carter is at the point that you can let him wander and he doesn't go far away from where he's supposed to be. But Claire will run away on her own so you have to watch her like a hawk. Luckily her legs are only a foot long, but the girl can still move.

XL

This was my best birthday ever! I had a big party Saturday, for which Joanie spent the last 2 weeks (her version of Jeff's Birthday Fortnight) cooking and baking. What she pulled off was the party of the .4 century, by which others will be judged. On Sunday I had a small family party with presents along the theme of 'Dad, Please Play With Us': a Hot Wheels car from Carter (which I opened so he could show me how it works, I haven't seen it since), a kickball, a cool Frisbee, York Peppermint Patties, and 2 Wii controllers (yet we don't have a Wii ... something is afoot). Some joker gave me a bottle of Centrum Silver vitamins also.

Déjà View

Back to Orlando again this week to give a couple speeches at a conference. This is the view out my 18th floor window of the gargantuan Orange County Convention Center where we had Photoshop World last week. I'm staying at a little more upscale place this time around — drinking glasses in the bathroom instead of individually wrapped styrofoam cups. Had a swim tonight and am putting finishing touches on tomorrow's PowerPoint.

Jeff's Birthday Fortnight Begins

I'm not one of these people who gets all demure when it's my birthday. I milk it for all it's worth. I don't wait for somebody to make me a cake, I bring the donuts in myself. So today officially begins my birthday fortnight. So far my family hasn't bought into treating me specially for more than one day. The two-week campaign barrels ahead nonetheless. I figure someday they'll catch on.

Cocoa Beach

If you know your I Dream of Jeannie, NASA is right up the road from Cocoa Beach. It is beautiful and undeveloped, more like the Florida I remember growing up. Ron Jon Surf Shop is there and I got to watch some surfers out at sunset. I queried the locals for a good fish place and found a great meal at Florida's Seafood Grill. I had a huge mixed plate which was excellent, except for the burly guy next to me at the bar, who was pretty lit-up and really wanted to have a conversation. When he asked me the second time what I did for a living, I started speed-eating the rest of my shrimp (never a bad thing) and ducked out when he went to the Buoys' restroom (as opposed to the Gulls').

Beam Me Up, Scott

I've been at this year's Star Trek-themed Photoshop World in Orlando three days and my brain is already full ... and there's still one more day to go. This is me and my new buddy Scott Kelby, the mastermind behind this huge conference (3,000 people) and author of many good Photoshop books. Joanie even knows who Scott is, the hero worship is that bad. This picture is posted for the express purpose of making a friend on a photo trip to Paris extremely jealous. You know who you are. [Photo by RC Concepcion.]

The Right Stuff

It's been almost exactly 27 years since my first visit to Kennedy Space Center. I was there to view the very first liftoff of the Space Shuttle in April 1981, except they scrubbed the launch and held it a few days later on my birthday. I handed my camera to a guy who sounded Dutch, and throughout the day I heard loads of other accents. Foreign tourists to KSC may outnumber the Yanks. Lighting-nerd caption: check out the perfect Rembrandt lighting pattern on my sweaty face, indicated by the nose shadow connecting to the cheek shadow, causing the triangle of light on the cheek opposite the light. It's like I planned it.

Standing under the Shuttle. There's a little sign saying these are pretend heat tiles. The fine print: Do not attempt to use for re-entry.


This is the Rocket Garden, where they show the earliest missiles NASA cut its teeth on.



By far the best part of the tour you take is the simulated moon launch in the control room used by the actual Apollo ground crew. The skylight windows vibrate like they're going to come down on you. From there you pass through a door into a gigantic shed where they keep a spare Saturn V which you can wander around underneath. Check out the scale of the small people in the lower corner of the photo. People overuse the word "awesome," but the scale of this rocket definitely is.