¿Qué Onda Guero?

I’ve recently taken a fancy to street photography. I like observing people and imagining what they’re thinking about. Street photography seems to be a logical extension of that. Ideally, the photographer should be discreet. Keep the camera away from your face. Don’t use flash. Learn to see with your hands, so to speak. Unless you’re Bruce Gilden, who breaks all those “rules”.

I shot these with the camera hanging from a strap on my shoulder and I used a remote wireless trigger to trip the shutter.

Miette Patisserie is a San Francisco area pastry shop. I picked this up at their Ferry Building location, on the Embarcadero. It tasted as good as it looked. Creamy and tart lime filling housed in a buttery, crunchy graham cracker crust, topped with smooth, lightly toasted meringue. Not as good as what Karen would’ve made, but pretty good nonetheless.

I pass by Poplar Creek Forest Preserve frequently on my way to work. There are brief windows of time every year when, on some days, the view here will take your breath away. The early morning sun breaking through the trees, burning up the low-lying fog over Bode Lake. It’s simply stunning. The time frame when you can catch this beautiful, almost dreamlike, vision is usually between the last couple weeks of April and the first week of May, as well as the last couple weeks of September and the first week of October. The sun’s azimuth, at those specific times of the year, works perfectly with the composition of the trees and the lake, and the temperature and dew point work to add just the right amount of fog.

I shot these photos about a week after that perfect time of year in the fall. It was a little chillier and a bit more humid than I would’ve liked, so the fog was much more dense. I still like what came out of the camera though.

Some photos from a recent weekend camping excursion to Door county, Wisconsin.

I was hanging out with the 90th infantry division, a.k.a. the Tough ‘Ombres, when this gentleman approached.

A real 90th infantry WWII veteran. Quite a treat.

You may recall, last year I spent a day at Midway Village Museum in Rockford checking out the largest World War II reenactment in the US. Here’s a collection of photos from this year’s reenactment. I shot these in color and desaturated them in Photoshop.

Great Blue Heron on the Fox River in Carpentersville, IL

Karen picked up some catnip at the Green Market. That’s one happy kitten.

Karen is very picky about ingredients. Only the finest components are allowed anywhere near any of her food creations. I’m glad for this because I know just about everything she creates is going to be delicious and worth eating every bite. Not necessarily the most “healthy”, as some define healthy, but always very tasty and very fresh. When available, Karen prefers organic produce, grass-fed beef, free range chicken and hormone free milk, eggs and butter.

The Chicago Green City Market is “Chicago’s only year-round farmers’ market promoting local, sustainable farmers, producers and chefs by connecting them to the public through educational programming and special events.” You just can’t get ingredients like these at your local grocery, but you can get them at the Chicago Green Market. And if you go early on a Saturday morning, like we did, you avoid heavy traffic and crowds.

Little Bighorn was the only hard-and-fast planned stop for us on this trip out west. I won’t go into the history of what happened at Little Bighorn. If you don’t know what happened, you can read about it here and here and in a multitude of books. I suggest, even if you think you know what happened at Little Bighorn, read about it and then go there. I generally think the National Parks Service is the best thing the United States government has going for it, and the way the NPS handles Little Bighorn does not disappoint.

Before we started exploring the landscape, we sat in on one of the ranger talks they do there every couple of hours. The ranger we listened to is a good story teller and seemed knowledgeable and passionate about the subject. I recorded the entire 30 minute talk on my iPhone. Click here to view the video (or right-click on the link to download it to your desktop). You might need to download and install QuickTime for Windows if you’re having trouble viewing it.

One of the uniquely engaging aspects of this battlefield is the stone markers placed on the ground near where individual soldiers and warriors fell. The photo below is of some of the markers on Last Stand Hill, where Lt. Col. Custer and his brother Tom were killed in action. Tom’s marker is directly in front of George’s.

About ten years ago, the National Parks Service began erecting granite markers for fallen Cheyenne and Lakota warriors as well. They chose red granite so it would stand out among the white stone markers erected for the troops of the 7th cavalry.

From the top of Last Stand Hill, looking north.

The sign reads:

The hill in front of you was occupied by Lakota and Cheyenne during the fight on Last Stand Hill. An unknown Sioux warrior wearing a warbonnet was killed here while firing his rifle at soldiers positioned behind a horse barricade on the crest of the ridge behind you. As soldier carbine fire ceased, victorious warriors rushed the hill.

From the top of Last Stand Hill, looking south, towards the Little Bighorn and the Indian village.

About halfway down the path, looking back at Last Stand Hill (on the right), the visitor center (just left of center) and Custer National Cemetery (on the left).

Continuing to make our way down the path, towards the Little Bighorn.

The path ends at Deep Ravine, where the last shots were fired on this part of the battlefield. Historians don’t know exactly why the soldiers were running into the ravine. It may have been a tactical maneuver or an attempt at escape. The text on the sign is red, faded and very difficult to read.