Welcome to my third Topical Tuesday. As you may have guessed already, I’m making some changes to how I’m working with my photos that I post here. I was talking to my good friend Rachel about how to make the photos on my blog stand out and look more professional while still using this current template platform (changes on that coming in January). I came up with a way to frame my photos (literally) along with a quick reference on how to tell which ones were taken with my main cameras, and which were taken with others (i.e. my iPhone or a point and shoot).
So from now on any photos taken with a main camera with have this lavender and silver triple frame along with NSSL letters, (Not So Still Life Photography) as a signature on the bottom (and a simpler frame for other photos, to be shown at the end of this entry).
I debated going back and using this frame method on all the photos I’ve posted so far, then decided not to. This blog is a work in progress and this entry, along with others shows improvements as I’m going along. Thanks to my readers for being on this journey with me.
The photo subject for today’s entry is 300, a bowling alley in San Jose. Though I had seen it from the outside previously, I had never gone in until this weekend. At my last Silicon Valley NACE (National Association of Catering Executives) meeting, I met Suzanne Frazier, who is the Sales Manager of Group Events who told me what a great place this was to have a party. Since I had my Sweet 16 party in a bowling alley, and Suzanne told me this would be like any alley I’ve been to before, I had to visit it when I was on that side of town.
I was given permission to take photos there with the caveat that I would not have people in them so as to respect the privacy of the guests. I counted several parties going on that day, mostly for young children.
It’s a very dark alley, with a music video playing on every screen above each lane.
Even the bar and lounge area are quite dark, yet inviting and beautiful at the same time. I especially liked the rainbow of all the literally glowing bottles of alcohol.
This sign got my attention. I’m familiar with a Back 9 in golf (the last set of holes), yet not in bowling. So, not even seeing a sign on the door saying it was closed for a private party, I went in.
Inside were nine bowling lanes (hence the name) that were currently not lit and ready to go and this cozy little bar. When some staff members came out to set up for the party (from the sign I missed), I quickly and quietly left.
This morning I woke up an hour early accidentally. I think my body wanted to make sure I didn’t miss the special Fitness Scavenger Hunt at Community Bootcamp. While some of the items we had to find were easy (paper clip, candy or food wrapper), some were downright hard, like the pine cone. I never did find one, though neither did a lot of others. I did get a lot of exercise in running from building to building, doing the exercises after finding each item (i.e. push ups, step ups, lunges, etc.). My Garmin watch clocked 1.33 miles for the activity, however, as it depends on satellites and I was indoors a bit looking for the items, it was probably more like 1.5 miles. It was a great workout, and I’m always glad to try new workouts.
I’ve been on the fence about the Silicon Valley Turkey Trot. This morning brought a San Jose Groupon offer to my email box, and so I was able to register for only $25 instead of $40 in person (or $35 online). Groupon works by offering great coupons you can purchase (i.e. 40% off something local, but only if a set number of people sign up and prepay). At first I didn’t think we’d get 25 people to buy the offer and lock in the price, then it tipped over (reached 25) at 10:35 a.m. The power of the Internet continues to amaze me daily.
Yesterday was the first day that I’ve had this blog that I didn’t blog. I’m OK with that. I could have squeaked out an entry late last night, yet I realized blogging 3 times a week minimum is probably more realistic (and I may still do more depending on the weeks). I’m going to definitely keep Tuesdays going and probably do Thursdays and Sundays as well.
For photos taken with my iPhone (a term WordPress still thinks is spelled incorrectly as it even apparently does WordPress which is even funnier according to the dotted red line I see when typing either) or other non professional cameras, I’ll just use a simple black frame as I did for this closeup of a Lego car I photographed. Be on the lookout for an entry with many such frames soon.
Not So Still Life Photography Blog 