Tons of pics, part 1

I've received some compliments on my pics over the years, and I'm pretty proud of that. About 95% of the population says that they love taking photos as a hobby, and some even buy those really nice cameras with all sorts of options and lenses and what-have-you. I don't know that much about photography, and I've considered investing in those nice cameras and learning all the shutter speed and lighting stuff, but when it comes down to it, I don't want to have to lug a big camera and all the special lenses around. I like having a small camera I can stuff in my pocket, because if there's something I've learned about picture taking, it's all about being in the right place at the right time. So, luck. There, I've said it.

Heidi asked me to send her a bunch of pictures a couple of weeks ago and so I spent a lot of time sorting through my favorites. I've left them in their full-size so you can steal them if you like. Or spit on them, see if I care.


The Sunday before we got married, Mel and I went down to the National Mall to spend some time together. I've always liked night shots and spend a great deal of effort trying to get the shots to turn out clear. I like how I finally got one of those pictures with the streaking car lights. This is looking across the Potomac from behind the Lincoln Memorial.
This is the same place as the last pic, but from ground level.
We were waiting for a comedy show to start at Berkley College, walking around Back Bay (the area between Fenway and the financial district) when we saw this little scene.
I was touring some old Egyptian palace in Alexandria and all these school kids on a field trip decided to play a little hide and seek with the obvious American tourist. They started chasing me down this corridor, and I took the picture...and ran.
My first Thanksgiving in Boston I wanted to take a trip to Montreal. I made a friend in the ward who said he wanted to go, but he flaked out at the last second, so I went by myself. It was really, really cold, but Montreal was worth it.
As a Varsity Scout, we did a 6-day backpacking trip behind the Tetons that I always wanted to go and do again. I convinced Jason and Sam to do the trail with me, and the scenery was unparalleled. I still want to do it again.
I was sitting on the steps of this Buddhist monastery in Lhasa, Tibet, when I saw all these monks come out for their lunch break or something. I thought it would be a great picture to have one non-monk juxtaposed in a group of monks. So, yes, I did that for a picture. But the monks ate it up, trying to communicate with me, them not speaking a lick of English, me not speaking a lick of monkey. They were fascinated with my arm hair and beard.
This is a guest house at 12,000 feet, perched on a the crest of a mountain pass somewhere in the Himalayas near the Nepal-Tibet border. The night before, I went to bed at like 4 pm, I was so cold. I woke up around midnight, looked outside, and saw flashes of light in the valley below. I wondered why people were trekking at such a ridiculous hour. Then I realized that it was a storm, and I was ABOVE it. The whole week was pretty cloudy, so vistas were few and far between. I woke up and finally had one, so I took a bunch of pictures with the sun coming up. This is one of them.
For the first couple of days on the trek, we would walk through mountain villages that looked like this every few hours. Notice the little kid stepping out of his door doesn't have pants.
Looking at Cascade from the orchard near center street on 8th East. On the day I graduated, I happened to be driving home from the Training Table right at sunset.
Arlington. No stories here.

Foliage trip 2007 took us through St. Johnsbury, Vermont. We went over a bridge, and I'm a sucker for old-timey railroad stuff.

I've got more coming, don't worry.