...and then again.

I guess it takes an ice storm to get me back in the office to blog. I was reading that the last time blogged was on my birthday in May last year and now here it is February 2013.

I will say this, that last entry I did, well I went on to ride a 50 miler at the Carti ride with very little training.  File that under "dumb things I've done".  I really thought I was going to give up before it was over.  It was sad and made me put the bike back up.  I keep telling myself that this spring I will pull it back out and ride once again.  Several things would be different and the main one would be that I now have a truck.  I went for 2 years without a car or truck and last Labor Day I bought myself a truck.  It has been sheer freedom.  So now I'll be able to just go from work like I once did rather than going home and talking myself out of it.

A lot has happened since last May but you'll pick it all up along the way.  Here's a few teasers: I'm trying to lose some weight, I still am a photog, my daughter is getting married in August, Terri and I will be empty-nesters again, I have a shop now that the girls call the man cave, and I'm doing a lot of landscaping.

Here are a few shots from a few weeks ago at the rodeo in Benton.

Getting "it" back

I'm working on getting "it" back. Over the past two years it's not an unknown fact that I pretty much stopped riding my bicycle and eating way too much.  The result wasn't good.  I have had a time of thought and reflection and finally it's starting to make sense.  My Dad passed back just a few days before Thanksgiving and even today I felt a tear in the corner of my eye as I opened the birthday card my Mom had given me on Saturday to find it saying "Love, Mom".  I don't know, I guess I just always thought she would write "Love, Mom and Dad".

I got back on my bike on Sunday afternoon and rode for the first time in about a year.  I may have ridden 6 times maybe in the past 2 years.  I used to be on it everyday almost but the honest truth, I got burnt out.  I did so great rides, huge rides but somewhere along the way I just got bored and burnt.  Boy did I have a new attitude on Sunday.  I had a blast and woke a sleeping giant.

I thought to myself, Ok I need some motivation to keep me going so I signed up for the CARTI Tour de Rock on June 9th.  I'm just going to go 50 (half-century) sense I just feel I would be pushing it to pull a century (100 miles) so soon back in he saddle.

I will be out riding on  Monday and Wednesday evenings and then either Saturday or Sunday.  Once I get my legs back I'll ride Saturday and Sunday but I'll ride to the river from the house like I once did.

Yes I'll still be posting photos.  I'll figure out some way to ride with a camera safely stashed away.

It's hard to believe that 3 years ago I was getting off my bike at 9am having completed a 24 straight ride.  Oh the place you go!

Life is good!

Little Rock Marathon 2012

My daughter in the black and her pal Amy running a stylish LR Marathon. CONGRATS on a big finish you two!

Baseball

Site scouting

Of course I would do this on the coldest day of the year. Site scouting. I'm gearing up and getting ready to start shooting soccer and baseball for the season. I wanted to get a feel of the fields so I have started visiting. Sylvan Hills has a beautiful new field which was nicely protected. I'm excited about getting out there and capturing the Bears in action. Sylvan Hills always produces some good players.

Soon this scoreboard will be lit up.

I spotted a pipe and couldn't resist a little sun flare through the pipe shot.

College of the Ozarks

One of the hidden secrets of the Ozarks is the College of the Ozarks. I was told there were some nice photo ops there. It's just outside of Branson. The next exit actually. The college is unique because the kids who graduate don't have a debt if they work on campus. There was a sense of pride in the students we met. I got to see greenhouses, cattle and one of the crown jewels of the place, the restaurant. We were told to go to brunch on Sunday and boy were we surprised. It was out of this world. A student from Puerto Rico made my omelet. Our server was a Criminal Justice major. The furniture was some of the most beautiful handcrafted pieces. The service was 5 star as was the food. Very much worth the stop!

I took time to photograph around the mill that seems to be almost in the center of campus.

National Ice scuplting competition

We headed up to Branson for the weekend just to get away. Talk about a quite town. One guy told me, "You can lay in the middle of highway 76 for half the day and not get run over." He was right. No shows and even a lot of restaurants were closed until March. Now the sales were big time. We saw 85% off in a couple of stores.

The surprise of the weekend was there just happened to be the National Ice Sculpting Competition going on and it was free. The tents were packed and of course it was older folks or kids so I too it easy on getting great photos. One time I also started to wiggle on through the crowd to the front but I just didn't feel like this was the place for that.

These guys are great. One fast competition was 15 minutes and one guy had a beautiful fish done within about 10 minutes. He was a real showman. Dancing around and we all just waited for an arm to fly across the room. I mean the dude was slinging a chainsaw!