After upgrading to Gallery2 I didn’t like how the thumbnails were handled; people’s heads were cropped off in many of them. I figured I’d go back and fix it eventually. Well after working on Kasey’s Prom photos and her head being either cut in half or missing altogether in the thumbnail I decided it was time to figure out what was going on. I discovered it has to do with the square thumbnails plugin so I disabled it. Square thumbnails make the albums appear consistently in Gallery giving a clean and neat look , but who cares if they are neat if the image isn’t represented properly?
I do like the consistent clean look so I will revisit square thumbnails and see what options there are that may take care of the bad cropping.
It took longer than I planned, but I finally posted the clothed photos from the glamour workshop with Jenna Haze. I wanted to upgrade to Gallery2, change my website over to a blog format, and then get caught up on my 2008 photos. I will be posting the topless and nude photos in their own albums with some sort of password. As I stated in an earlier post this is to make it harder than just clicking to enter an adult oriented photo album.
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While on my way to a customer’s site in Pittsfield I ended up behind this jeep. The saying on the spare tire is great, you’ll have to click the photo to see it though.
Awhile back (read this as years ago) I decided to learn how to program in Windows so I wrote a Windows Uptime Utility called WinUp. I intend to work on it some more, but just haven’t been in the programming mood.
I heard about a glamour photography workshop that was being held in Dayton, OH by PGLAM and the model was adult film star Jenna Haze! I’ve seen my share of glamour photo galleries on line and once I heard about this I just had to go. At the workshop I learned a few things about studio flash and how to work with a live model. All of this could be picked up by reading some glamour photography books, but learning it in person at a workshop was much more fun. At first I was a little nervous about taking photos of a live model, especially one that would be nude towards the end of the photo shoot, but Jenna was great to learn from. She was very funny and open, which shouldn’t be a surprise considering her line of work. I doubt I will be getting any studio flash equipment since photography is just a hobby for me, but it was a great experience and the knowledge I received will improve my posed photos.
Over the next few weeks I will be posting some of the photos from the workshop. There will be three separate galleries, the clothed photos, the topless photos and the nude photos. The last two will probably be password protected though. Not some crazy password, but something to make it harder to enter the gallery since I don’t think the gallery software I use has an age verification system.
We went to the Red Sox vs. Yankees game at Fenway Park on Friday night, unfortunately they lost. I haven’t been to a Red Sox game that they’ve won yet, although it was only the second game I’ve ever been too. I have tickets to a Tampa Bay Devil Rays game expecting the Sox to beat them.
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Tuesday, February 26, 2008
During February vacation Rebecca and I went to Clearwater, FL to visit my parents for a couple days. Then we headed over to Orlando. We went to Universal Studios for a couple days and had a great time riding the Fire and Ice roller coaster multiple times. We also went to Disney’s Epcot where we rode Mission Space more times than I can remember. On the way into Mission Space you would be asked if you want spinning or no spinning. My answer was always “Spinnnning”. Before going to Epcot we went to the Magic Kingdom so we could ride Splash Mountain, Thunder Mountain Railroad, and my favorite Space Mountain. It’s a tame coaster, but in the dark. The next day we went to Hollywood Studios, we rode Tower of Terror a few times, but the first time was the best… the surprise was gone after that. We also rode the Rockin Roller Coaster which was awesome. Another Disney coaster in the dark, but not as tame as Space Mountain. It had such a long wait we used the Fast Pass system, so we only rode it once. The next day we went to Animal Kingdom and it was a rainy day. This actually worked out since the animals tend to be out more during the rain. The hard part was eating lunch outside with our ponchos on in the rain. The first thing we did was the Kilimanjaro Safari. You rode through the habitat without fences. There were lions on a large rock formation near us, rhinos walking up the road and we just waited for them to move. Later we rode the Expedition Everest coaster which was good. Disney’s coasters are tame and both of us like the Superman coaster at Six Flags New England.
Each day we would park at Epcot and take the tram or bus to the park we were going to visit. When we finished the other park we would come back to Epcot and eat at one of the countries in the World Showcase. Rebecca seemed to like Canada…. That’s all I can say though. 😉
The last day in Florida we packed for the flight, but took a ride over to Safety Harbor and were able to see a manatee.
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The first day started off pretty good. It was a small class, less then 10 of us and no one under 30. We introduced ourselves and then started going through the BRC training book. Then we took a break for lunch and met at the riding course. The riding course was at the end of one of the runways at Orange airport, right near Jumptown. 🙂
We all got to pick out the bike we wanted to use. I chose a blue Suzuki GS250. Then we all got used to sitting on the bike and feeling it’s weight. Then while sitting we walked it over and got in line next to each other. We would walk the bike slowly releasing the clutch to the opposite side and back again. As we got comfortable we would lift our feet off the ground, continue to release the clutch and coast while balancing the bike. I picked up pretty quickly, even one of the instructors asked if I had rode a bike before, which I haven’t. The exercises progressed as we rode in a big circle getting used to riding more. Then we would ride from one spot to another and stop. Now you really should use both brakes, I know this, I’ve read it plenty of times during my week of studying. So I’m riding towards the rider coach and for some reason I panicked and squeezed the front brake and locked it up which caused me to fall off the bike. Landing on my right hand, shoulder and head. Thankfully I was wearing gloves, a jacket and a helmet. I scrapped up the gloves and my jacket, but mostly felt bad/stupid for falling off. They were super cool about it and had me take a break. My crash broke the front fender off which they gave me to take home as a souvenir. After I had a break it was back on the bike and ride some more. I was now very good at using both brakes. They even pointed that out the next day. That night when I got home I was wiped out and laid on the couch and went to bed. My wrist was killing me since that was what I landed on first.
The next day I went back and my wrist was killing me, I wondered how I was going to ride the bike for five hours and pass the test. When I went into the class one of the other students thanked me for being the first one to fall, he thought he would be the first. 🙂 The class started and we finished going through the workbook and then took the test. After turning in the test I grabbed some food and headed over to the riding course where we all waited to hear what the results were. If you didn’t pass the written test then there was no point in continuing. They showed up and told us that everyone had passed and one person got a 100%, ME. 🙂 It made me feel good since I had studied the workbook (that you can get online) during the week before the class started. In the end I was the one who crashed though. You may know to use both brakes and can answer that on a test, but the real test is when you are on the bike. There isn’t as much time to consider your options. Now it’s time to ride some more. We do some more tricky riding exercises including the figure eight within a relatively small rectangle. We also ride down a straight line, shifting up and the rider coach is in front of us and tells us which direction to turn, we put our blinker on and turn in that direction, but with the speed we are up to you don’t just turn the wheel, you use countersteering. Sounds kind of weird, but it works. After we finish the exercises we have a break then line up for the testing. One guy, the one that said he was glad I crashed first decided to leave the course early. He wasn’t ready and he was smart enough to do the right thing. After we finish our testing they told us that we all passed and gave us our certificates. Yeah! I passed! Time to go home and give my wrist a break.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Signed up for the Motorcycle Safety Foundation’s Basic Rider Course at SM Motorcycle School in Gardner, MA for this weekend. Five hours of classroom training and ten hours of riding time. The classroom training is in the morning and the riding is in the afternoon. I’ve been a passenger on a motorcycle, but never the driver. There is a written test you have to pass before you can take the riding test. Time to study.
After skydiving a couple times I decided that I wanted to learn how to ride a motorcycle. So I went to the Registry of Motor Vehicles and picked up the motorcycle permit book. I studied that for a while then went back to take the permit test. The first few questions were on the Junior Operator License and I didn’t really study that stuff. I skipped the first question, then got the next 3 wrong. Not good, but I answered the remaining questions correctly and past! Now it’s time to sign up for the motorcycle training course.