An Empty Glass...and Some Pictures

I have finally figured it out. I have a very set amount of Creativity in my being, so when it is being used up on Project A, there is little left for Project B. It's like I start with a glass full of Creativity. Then I slowly pour it on on one thing, resulting an empty glass.

I've been pouring (see?) all of my creativity into planning school for next year, so there has been little left for anything else (ie: photography and writing). But you know what I discovered? I have skipped 3 or 4 of my regular photography challenges, and--are you ready for this? Life kept going on as normal; the world did not end, the planet did not implode.

So I've decided that, since there is more to my life than just blogging and photography, I'm not going to put so much pressure on myself to post daily and link up, link up. In fact, for this post, I am pulling photos from the archives--more from our New York City trip.

I feel that, in photography, my greatest weakness is portrait photography. The following pictures are the result of the first planned "shoot" I did, though I wouldn't even call it that since it was a rushed 5 minutes I took as Mark checked out of our hotel. I guess I should also mention I kind of bribed my children to act right; they are a little tired of the lens and are becoming less and less cooperative.

I had seen this warehouse door with the graffiti several times in our walks down the road. I thought it was a perfect backdrop for some shots of the kids. I'm not entirely happy with all of them. I shot them in manual and, I guess, got the shutter speed too slow for photographing kids because some of them were blurry. I find that converting to black and white helps cover up some of the blurriness. Anyway, there are a lot of photos here, but I felt bad leaving any out.

Here are my girls:



















And my rascally boys:

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. V

I had this post all written and scheduled today, came in this morning to link up, and found it had disappeared! How strange! So I'm just going to give the photos to you without much explanation (well, as much as I had before). Phew! What a relief for you, huh?

1. Something Tiny
I have a few tiny things around the house because I think tiny things are cute. Here is an itsy-bitsy tube of toothpaste Mark got on his flight to Germany a couple weeks ago:


More tiny things:




2. High Key
Times Square is definitely high key.


EDIT: After seeing some of your photos, I clearly did not understand this prompt. But whatcha gonna do? Not reshoot it. Right now anyway. Because I am comfortably planted on my couch in front of the TV. Not moving right now. Even for the camera.

3. Bedroom
Nothing special about our bedroom in our rental house, so here is the view from our hotel bedroom last weekend:


A better view the afternoon we got there:


And the same view but with the morning sunshine casting such a different look:


4. Off in the Distance
This is a stretch for this prompt, but this photo holds special memories for our family. Can you see it? Do you see anything off in the distance?


You can't? Well, the kids really, really, really wanted to go see the Statue of Liberty, but it was just too stinkin' cold to get on a boat. But when we were on the flight deck of the Intrepid, the kids were very excited because they were the first to spy our Lady Liberty waaaay off in the distance. Maybe this will help. A little. Maybe.


5. Stripes
Not 10 minutes after I saw this week's prompts last Sunday, I looked out our hotel window and saw this. I just love how the light plays with the shadow of the buildings to create stripes on the road. Not to mention the stripes that are painted on the street as well as the stripes created by the rows of the windows on the buildings.

The Final Details About What We Did in NYC

The first thing that grabbed me as we drove into the city, of course, was the architecture. I'm a sucker for a photo of interesting buildings, and I took a few hundred. Here is a sampling:

Part of Trump's Empire.

I love the colorful apartments with the fire escapes.




And I love the water towers that sit atop many of the buildings.


We checked into our hotel Friday afternoon. We were treated to a very fancy hotel in which we had 2 adjoining rooms. Mark's brother had free vouchers and was going to join us but at the last minute couldn't make it. Someone had to use the vouchers, and though it was a tough call, we volunteered to be that someone.

Parking cost a fortune at the hotel, but we turned the keys over to the valet anyway because we didn't know any better. Later we saw other parking options that were cheaper, but the penalty for taking the car out of valet parking and moving it elsewhere would have been greater than just leaving it there, so we just chalked it up to Lesson Learned for Next Time. Because I witnessed this kind of parking option in action on The Amazing Race a couple weeks ago, I was fascinated to see the real thing.


After we got settled in our room, we decided to head out into the frigid, gusty wind. We fought our way through it to Times Square.


On the agenda for Times Square: ToysRUs on steroids.


An enormous ferris wheel sits just inside the revolving doors.


And there is a section called Candyland which hocks, you guessed it, candy.


Having grown up in a third world country, I always experience a mixture of emotions when I observe overdone things like this ToysRUs. There is always still just a tinge of amazement, almost like a little culture shock to see so much. There is also disgust at the indulgence of Americans, the way everything must be over-the-top and way more than necessary. Last, there is just a little bit of amusement as I imagine the reaction of any African over such, well, what can only be tagged absurdity.

Following Times Square, we walked further to Rockefeller Center

where the kids visited the Lego store, and I enjoyed the tranquility of St. Patrick's Cathedral.


And following our long walk back, we searched for a place to have dinner. Clearly New York City is not made for families our size because there seemed to be few eating establishments that would accommodate us. We finally settled on a place that looked larger than the others and that offered some familiarity for us as well. It was called Southern Hospitality, and it served BBQ. Not the best BBQ in the world, but we did remind ourselves that we were in NYC, not Atlanta, plus we got to enjoy fresh brewed sweet tea with our meal.

The next day, we spent the morning at The Sea, Air, and Space Museum followed by our taxi drive to 59th and 3rd where we visited Dylan's Candy Bar.






The kids were permitted to pick out one item. With so many choices, it was a tough decision to make.


After our subway trip back to Times Square, a walk back to the hotel, and a few moments to catch our breath, our tummies were growling. Time for the dinner hunt again. Around the corner from our hotel is the Hell's Kitchen area, so there were a lot of choices, but again, such tiny little restaurants. We noticed driving in 3 Thai restaurants, all with the same name but with 2-4 storefronts separating them. We found that odd but later heard from our concierge that they are indeed the same restaurant and probably share a kitchen underground or in back somewhere, but they just couldn't get enough property all clumped together. So we went into one, made reservations for another, and then went back to the hotel to wait for our reservation time. It was worth the wait - the best Thai food we've ever had! A great way to end the evening...

...and to end our trip. Because when we woke up leisurely the next morning, it was time to head back home to the country. By contrast anyway.

St. Patrick's Cathedral

I was doubtful that I would have the opportunity to visit St. Patrick's Cathedral because, well, there's just something about saying, "OK, kids, let's go visit that church so Mom can take pictures" that elicits much eye rolling and sarcastic remarks like, "Wow, Mom, that sounds like a lot of fun." But...when I saw that the Lego store was but a half a block from this beautiful cathedral, I seized the opportunity. I sent Mark in to the loud, crowded Lego store with four children while I spent several quiet, remarkable moments in a stunningly gorgeous place.

St. Patrick's Cathedral opened its doors in 1879.






(from St. Patrick's Cathedral New York website): "As Brendan Gill wrote in his introduction to St. Patrick’s Cathedral: A Centennial History, 'In the Old World, for well over a thousand years the center of a city was thought to be wherever its Cathedral stood…



We are a city that, even within its comparatively narrow confines, has always tended to spin apart. To speak only of Manhattan (the original New York City of Hughes’ day), we have Wall Street and Greenwich Village and Chinatown and Chelsea and Times Square and the Upper East Side and Riverside Drive and Harlem and Washington Heights and scores of other districts and neighborhoods; yet we have few places that convey an authentic sense of being at the very heart of things. St. Patrick’s is such a place.



Aided by the graceful presence of its neighbor, Rockefeller Center …, the Cathedral dominates Fifth Avenue as easily today as it has ever done…






Thanks to the program of preservation carried out under the watchful eye…, the building has never looked more beautiful.



There it stands for our delight and, if necessary, for our consolation.



Its front steps are a parvis, if not a Paradise, and young and old take the sun upon their faces there as a sort of benediction, while the scattered benedictions of a thousand rosy candles wink and twinkle within.'"