Mi Vida Ocupada

Massive Attack is a group from the U.K. and according to Wikipedia, ” Massive Attack are a collaborative British music production duo from Bristol. Working alongside co-producers, various favoured session musicians and guest vocalists, they make records and tour live. The duo are considered to be progenitors of the trip hop genre.”

Check out Massive Attack’s custom channel on Youtube
Here is a video of the song “Teardrop” from the 1998 album Mezzanine

You may not have heard of Massive Attack but chances are pretty good that you have heard their music before in various commercials and movie soundtracks.  We have been listening to their stuff for at least a decade now but never had a chance to see them Live until they decided to come to the USA for a quick, 3-city tour (NYC, Boston, and San Fran).  We had talked for several weeks about seeing them in Boston but were only able to make it work once I traded in my car for a newer one.  Despite the long drive and getting lost countless times in Boston, the show was absolutely AMAZING!!

The show was at the House of Blues in Boston so I did my research and got driving directions from our hotel.  Stupid Google directions and stupid Boston streets!!!  Of course the directions sucked and I got lost once again.  After driving further away from where I needed to be and not having any idea where I needed to go, I asked a cabbie for directions.  He took pity on me and told me to follow him, and then  led us right to House of Blues.  There is no way we would’ve found it without him, we were several miles (and like a million mis-matched streets ) away in the wrong direction.

The House of Blues is a pretty cool venue.  You can take a virtual tour here.  We had box seats and thoroughly enjoyed the show immensely.  All of the following photos were taken from the Massive Attack Website.  Although I had called ahead and was told I was allowed to use a camera as long as I did not use flash, once I got there they made me “check” my camera because they do not allow cameras with detachable lenses. Blasphemy! (I have not yet even once been able to take photos at a concert with my Nikon D5000. Boo Hoo)

I am so glad we decided to go ahead and make the trip to Boston to see these guys.  It was worth every one of the 3,000 miles!!

I may have mentioned that I broke down and bought a 50mm f/1.4 Nikon lens about a month ago.  It is great! The lens, along with taking a  great photography class taught by Michelle, has really improved the quality of the photos I take.  Or at least I am working on it!  One of my assignments for the class was to photograph (and position) a live subject in front of a window to experiment with different lighting conditions.   We were supposed to aim for “catchlights”, which I have learned is the beautiful reflection of a window or a sky that is “caught” in a subject’s eye.  My cats cooperated somewhat, but I was really anxious to practice on a real person so when I had the opportunity to practice on this cute little guy who is 14-months-old, I went for it!  All that movement was quite a challenge for a amateur, but he was so cute I did get some decent shots:

I am not an aspiring portrait photographer or anything, but it is fun to change it up from the non-people photos I usually take!

Does my new signature show up??

I know I mentioned it before, but it is VOTING TIME over at Photo Hunt Challenges.  All of the categories from Ph#4 have a special post with all my favorite photos from that category and a poll to vote for your favorite.  Click on any of the links below to see them :) This voting is open to anyone, the more the merrier.  I just request that you vote for your favorite photo rather than for a particular person.

*PS- I have spent a lot of time working on the Photo Challenges Blog and would love for you to head over there to check out the changes I have made even if you don't feel like voting (but why wouldn't you love to look at pretty pictures?!)

Favorite ~ Fall Activity

Favorites ~  A Fall Treat

Favorites ~  A Harvest

Favorites ~ Leaves

Favorites ~ Fall Colors

Favorites ~ Something Orange

Favorites ~ Something Spooky

Favorites ~ A Cemetery

Favorites ~ A Costume

Favorites ~ A Black & White Photo

Favorites ~ A Critter

Favorites ~  Symmetry

Favorites ~ Contrast

Favorites ~ Texture

Favorites ~ A Logo/ Mascot

Favorites ~ Something Neon

Favorites ~ Something Inspiring

Favorites ~ Something Entertaining

Favorites ~ Something Fast

Favorites ~ Something Slow

A few weeks ago I blogged about how the MN Timberwolves organization remodeled our school library.  They also gave us several hundred free tickets so that students and their families could go see the Timberwolves play.  I was lucky enough to have my boss give me a handful of tickets to the game as well, so a group of friends and I went down to the Target Center on Friday night to see our young team play some ball vs. Milwaukee Bucks.

The game was kind of boring and we ended up losing, but it was still nice to be able to go to the game! My friends and I had fun :)

I've mentioned before that the weather around where I live has been really crummy this season.  It seems like it has been either rainy or just dreary every day for the past month.  We actually had a semi-decent day this Saturday with temps around 50' and no rain so  I took advantage of the nicer weather and went on a short walk at Tamarack.  The colors are past peak but some of them still looked pretty.  You can see some of my Tamarack photos here.

Mr Sun, Sun, Mr. Golden Sun……..

Please Shine Down on Me!!!

I absolutely LOVE animoto.com, they make it so easy to make cool videos!  Here is one I put together of the photos and video from our trip last weekend and I love how it turned out!

Look at how adorable Jake is in his new glasses! (Stolen from his mama's Facebook page).  So cute I had to share!

The girls and I spent last Friday night over at Mary's house, taking inventory of the benefit donations and putting baskets together for the silent auction.  Everyone has worked so hard putting it all together! A special thanks to Lanee, Sonja, Mary, and Daria for all the countless hours they have put into planning this event and seeking out donations.  These girls are the best BFFs you could ever ask for and I know Kim appreciates it more than ever.  All that hard work is going to make for a successful benefit.

Anyway, here are some photos from Friday night, taken from Lanee's camera….

I hope to see anyone who can make it to the Benefit on Friday night.  It is going to be a lot of fun! $5 at the door ~ includes an entry into the Raffle Drawing

Would you believe I accidentally dropped my camera in such a way that the darn thing is irreparable? That happened on August 2nd while on vacation in the mountains of Colorado.  Talk about a major bummer, not to mention bad timing at the start of a new Photo Hunt Challenge! Anyway, I was able to briefly borrow my dad's camera to try to complete the Challenge, but I am also supplementing the list with a few photos I took at the end of July that inspired some of the items I include in this challenge.  Hope that isn't a problem, but what else can I do without a camera?! Here are my photos, but please don't forget to check out the other Participant Entries!!!

1. A fountain (University of Texas Campus)

    2. A Road or Pathway (near Colorado River in Austin, TX)

    3. A Fence (outside Texas State Capitol in Austin, TX)

    4. A symbol (Texas Lone Star)

    5. A Black & White Photo (Breckenridge, CO)

    6. A clunker car

    7.
A cool car- Photo Coming ASAP!

    8.
A Portrait (my bff Kim and her son Jake)

    9.
Amusement (creating optical illusions while hiking in the Colorado Rockies)

   10. Back to School (the neighbor-girl's school supplies!)

   11.
Urban/ City (Austin, TX)

   12. Suburban (Breckenridge, CO)

   13. Country/Rural (Pine Tree Apple Orchard, MN)

   14.
Something Domestic (House in Breckenridge, CO)

   15.
Something Wild (Cute little squirrel in Austin, TX)

   16.
Something Silver (Tops of Vodka Bottles @ Minus 5' Ice Lounge ~ Stillwater, MN)

   17.
Something Gold (Fool's Gold – Boulder, CO)

   18. Something Shiny (Glazed Sun, MN State Fair)

   19.
Something Miniature (Miniature stuffed kitty with my cat Isis for size reference ;)

   20. Something Delicious (Turtle Cheesecake at Freight House ~ Stillwater, MN)

Please go to the Photo Hunt Challenges blog to check out all the Participant Entries

Colorado already seems like so long ago, so I feel like I better blog about the rest of my trip before I forget it all! lol.

So I mentioned before that I was in Boulder to celebrate my cousin Katie's marriage to E.Z. The two of them were married Aug 1st 2008 but waited to hold a reception until their 1st anniversary.  Since there were quite a few family members who came in from out-of-state, Katie and EZ hosted a picnic lunch at Boulder Park on Saturday afternoon.  We hung out for a couple of hours, eating and watching the kids play on the playground and swings.

Me and Katie.  She was one of my roommates when I went to school at SCSU

This is my uncle Mike and cousin Theresa

A view of the Boulder Mountains
 

After the picnic we went to Pearl Street to scope out a place for dinner and to do a little shopping.

Amanda and I had fun trying on these hats

Jeff, uncle John and my dad

 My aunt Joan, my mom and me

A cool glass gallery I had to check out.  Ended up getting myself a pretty new dichroic glass pendant (I am wearing it in the pic above!)

After walking around Pearl Street we stopped for a short while at University of Colorado-Boulder campus

After a full afternoon we headed back to the hotel to get ready for dinner and the dessert reception.  Another post on that coming soon!