So after dinner and then pool swimming on Friday night, Jenn headed out with me to catch some shots of the Ocean City neon. This picture was actually taken after dinner before we headed back to the hotel.

As a commentary to this picture, I have to say that we got baked potatoes at the restaurant and they were the most amazing, delicious potatoes that we had ever had. They were covered in cheese and bacon, and tasted absolutely amazing.

Fantastic Dinner

So on Saturday I decided to get my lazy butt out of bed and try to catch the sunrise. I was up and out on the beach by 6:45, problem was, I think the sun came up around 6:30 or earlier. I was still able to get a couple of neat shots, and as long as you realize that in order for the sun to be in the same shot as the ocean it must be a sunrise.

It was extremely quiet and peaceful out there that morning, which was neat. There were a few people here and there, and actually one in this picture (which I like because I think it gives some scale to the picture). It wasn't to cold, and overall it was neat to get up and catch a sunrise. Then head back to bed before we had to check out of the hotel. Enjoy!

Ocean Sunrise

We're back from the Ocean! We had a great time and I took quite a few pictures that I'll be sharing this week. I wanted to start with this picture that I liked. Friday afternoon after wandering down Coastal Highway then walking back up the beach, we stopped and sat on chairs like this one for a bit to just enjoy the beach sounds. Before we headed off, I thought that it might look neat to take some solo chair/beach shots and this is one of them. Enjoy!

Serene Scene

In support of my post yesterday I thought I would post a shot of the new and improved out of town scoreboard. Its really a lot better than the old light bulb based board. You can get some good details about other games if you're interested from this board. And from a design standpoint, I really like it. Its clear and very concise. As for this picture...Enjoy! And go to a game and see for yourself!

Out of Town

As a regular supporter of the Orioles by attendance, I was really excited last week to see the improvements to the scoreboard and surrounding displays that the team decided to make. The new jumbotron is simply amazing. You can see it in the outfield of this picture, and I think the fact that you can actually "see" and read the jumbotron is a testament to the new quality of it. In addition to this they replaced the out of town scoreboard with a swank new one, and all of the around the park scoreboard. The little ones that tell you pitch speed, and batter statistics.

In addition to the in park improvements, in this picture you can also see the new Hilton hotel that has been built to support the Convention Center. I'm still out on how I feel about the addition to the skyline but its there, and I can't change that. Its still a blast to go to the games, and see the spectacular views. Enjoy!

Camden Yards New View

Last week Jenn and I went outside to cook (this is the same outside evening as the cloudy moon), and there were two rabbits in the back yard chowing down on the grass. It was pretty cool to see them, as well as take some pictures of them. With the trusty super zoom (200mm) lens on the Nikon I was able to get close up pictures of the rabbits without disturbing them. I think they hung out for about 10 minutes or so before we had to go down and turn on the grill, thus running them off. As for the picture...Enjoy!

Rabbits In the Yard

To continue where I left off yesterday, this is a picture of the blooms of yet another tree. This tree however is my own, and in our front yard. About 10 days ago Jenn commented that tree in the front yard would be in bloom soon, and by the end of the week this is what had. What's even funnier to me is that in probably no more than 10 more days the majority of these pink blooms will be gone (from the tree, not my yard!) and we will have a wonderful green leafed tree. Springtime really is a wonderful colorful time of year. Enjoy!

Springtime Growth Pt. 2

Another picture from this weekend (much like yesterday's post), this is a picture of some of the blooms from a neighbors tree. I love the bright and vibrant white color of the petals. But what I really like here, and the reason I'm posting this specific picture is because I like the small red/pink blooms coming out of the white. Enjoy!

Springtime Growth

On Friday night Jenn and I had a nice relaxing dinner outside and as we were finishing up dinner I noticed the moon sitting low in the sky. What I thought was really cool about it was that the sky was still blue and actually had a hint of orange/red running through it. This picture almost looks hazy, but it really wasn't hazy, it was more the wispy clouds around the moon. Enjoy!

Sunset Moon

So yesterday you may remember I posted that it was Jenn and my 4th wedding anniversary. Like I said we went to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory (Jenn's request that I think has something to do with the enormous and by her account delicious pieces of cheesecake they sell). After dinner we headed downtown to the Orioles game.

Going to the game was bit of a spontaneous decision. When I got home from work, early to celebrate together, it was so nice outside. So I began to think that if we got done with dinner in time we should think about going to the game. That way we could spend time together and not be distracted by "house" things.

The game was really good, and the O's managed to pull out a victory in 10 innings! This was the first time we have had the opportunity to go to a game this year, so that was also really nice. The new scoreboard looks amazing, something I'll be sure to post a picture or two of next week. Overall, a wonderful 4th wedding anniversary!

4

Today is Jenn and I's 4th Wedding Anniversary. I wanted to post a picture of us but wasn't able to find one quickly that I hadn't posted before. This picture is from a few weeks ago when we baked cookies. To celebrate Jenn and I are going to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and then next week we're going to Ocean City to stay for a few days for a nice peaceful getaway.

Our Anniversary

I got an email today from Royal Caribbean telling me about a new ship they are building. These are spam emails that I usually just delete and move on from, however for whatever reason I decided to give this one a look.

The email pointed me to this site to tell me about their new ship, Project Genesis. The reason I'm sharing all this information and posting a picture is because of the feature they are putting on this new ship. They are going to build a "Central Park" in the middle of the ship. Thats nuts! From the looks of the picture and the reading material, they are building a 6 deck promenade that will be open air, and made to feel like a park. I think its a crazy inventive and different idea, one that I would certainly love to see first hand. Below is one of the conceptual renderings of this "Central Park". Enjoy!

Central Park

I took this picture at the BWI Trail last weekend. I was playing around with the focus putting the foreground in focus, and then the background. I posted both to the Picasa gallery if you're curious, but I liked this one better. Not 100% sure why, but I like it better. Either way, enjoy the picture and don't forget to mail your taxes!

Trail Posts

Again, continuing the trend of the season I wanted to post some more pictures I took recently of flowers. This little purple diddy lives at my parents house. This is a crocus says my dad, and I'm sure he's right. It obviously hasn't bloomed yet, but what I love is the vibrant purple color of the flower. Enjoy!

Spring Flowers

This evening Jenn and I were up in Glen Burnie (is there really any better place to spend a Saturday evening?). When we were done and leaving the establishment we were visiting (saying establishment makes Target sound so nice doesn't it...) there was this awesome cloudy/skyish sunset going on. So i luckily had my camera in the car and I took a couple of shots of it from the parking lot. Those don't look so cool though. I asked Jenn to drive home and on our way, down Rt. 10, I took this picture. This is pretty much how the sky looked. That dark ominous gray mass with the beautiful blue sky with orange highlights of sunset. Enjoy!

Awesome Cloud Cover

For this I didn't think it necessary to come up with a creative title. Something basic covers it. As for the picture, I took this at the Dorsey Rd. airport park last Saturday. It was pretty cool watching a few planes come in and getting outside to enjoy the weather. Enjoy!

Airplane

I think that at first look this picture is nothing more than a reminder of the gloom we've had in our skies all week long. But what I'd like people to take from this picture is the really cool (i think) reflections of the clouds in the water. This picture was taken on Tuesday around 7:30 when the clouds were starting to break up. You can see the clear blue sky fading into the clouds on the shoreline. Enjoy!

Cloudy Reflections

So last year (about 8 months ago now) I got the LEGO set you see below as a gift from my parents. Given a busy schedule, and what seems like no time to put these things together, I just finally last night sat down to put this together. Its about 575 pieces I think, most of which are in that ring you see (which by the way was EXTREMELY redundant to put together). On the whole it was fun and I think it looks neat. Enjoy!

Birthday Gift

A few weeks ago Jenn and I (with Matt and Kristy) attended our first Baltimore Blast indoor soccer game. The game was actually a lot of fun, I say "actually" because I didn't think it would be. I kinda figured it would be a low scoring run fest, but it was actually a high scoring run fest. The Blast won the game and are headed to the playoffs for MISL yet again. This picture in particular was taken from our seats and is a 3 picture panoramic to get a good feel of the field. Enjoy!

Blast Field

It must be a special day if I post twice in one day...right? Anyways, there is a new online tool being offered by the folks at Adobe. The new tool is called Photoshop Express. This tool allows for basic image manipulation online, and offers 2GB of storage space for you images for free. In addition to uploading your images, you can choose to sync the tool with a few other image libraries out there, in my case you can sync with Googles Picasa web albums.

So with the tool I edited one of my pictures to this point. I used a sketch effect to give it that 'hand-drawn' look, and then used a color pop feature to bring out only the yellow of the daffodil flower. Then finally I desaturated the image a little bit to make the yellow less bright, and more in line with the rest of the gray of the image. I think thats about it. I like how it turned out, hence the sharing today! Enjoy!

Something Artistic

In case you hadn't heard, and you can read a bit more here about it, the people in the United Arab Emirates are building the worlds tallest building. The building is already 2,200 feet tall, and is expected to keep on growing. By contrast, the Empire State Building (with spire) is 1,472 feet tall. I wanted to share this because I think its 1. crazy that there is any building in the world this big; 2. REALLY impressive that there is a building that is this big and able to stand. Enjoy!

Crazy Tall Building

So after 5 and half years of good service, the factory installed radio on my Mustang is done its faithful service. For at least the last 2/3 years I have used the factory installed stereo to listen to my iPod. You might wonder how...and therein is the beauty of it all.

I had the odd fortune of having a radio with a tape deck installed (came that way). Well it just so happens that those old tapes that you used to get a CD played to work in your car would work the exact same way with an iPod and I was perfectly content to have it work that way.

About a year ago I destroyed 1 of those tape adapter things in a fit of rage (it involved crushing the tape then throwing it out the car window). 1 replacement tape adapter later I last about another 8 months until more problems occurred. It seemed as if the tape player itself had gone up. No more iPod music for Drew. This happened about 2 months ago.

To wrap this story up, I've never been fond (i.e. I hate) those iPod radio transmitters. We had one for Jenn's car and the sound just wasn't ever that good. Always had some static and often time interference. So what else is there to do...get a good deal on a used radio with iPod connector (thanks Chad). A little bit of wiring and fidding later (thanks Duerling) and I have a new radio/iPod music player in my car. Not only will the player work without problem, but it will charge as it plays! So this photo is so much for everyone else to enjoy as it is for me to share my enjoyment with a car accessory!

New Radio!

Today on the wonderful internet I read an article about the new Super Bowl ring the the Giants had made for them. You can read the article here if you'd like, but personally I think that the picture kinda sums it all up. For those that didn't know - this is the Giants third Super Bowl win, hence the 3 trophies on the face of the ring. The ring was designed by Tiffany & Co., who also makes the Lombardi trophy. Even though I'm far from a Giants fan I can recognize a beautiful ring when I see it. I'm glad to see that they went the classy route with the stones and design, as opposed to making it offensively colorful. Enjoy!

Expensive Ring

So what should you do after you take the time to make some from scratch fresh baked cookies? Why...eat all of them at once of course!

Bakin' Cookies

During a recent small group conversation, the question was asked "What do you like most about spring". My gut reaction is to answer that I love the fresh cool air that you can let into the house because its no longer to cold, and its not to hot yet. Yet from a photographic standpoint, I don't think there could be a much better time to photograph nature other than spring (except of course the grand colors available during fall). Which brings me to today's post. This is a close up shot of one of the branch's of the pear tree in our backyard. It is slowly blooming into one of those big white tree you see this time of year. And of course in about 2-4 weeks I'll have a tree full of leafs, but until then I have a tree full of photographic opportunity. Enjoy!

Springtime Growth

As many should know I'm an avid Orioles fan (see yesterday's post), however I wouldn't be much of a baseball fan if I wasn't excited about a new baseball stadium opening up just 45 minutes from home. The shot below is of the new Nationals Park (as it is currently named, I assume the corporate naming rights are coming soon...). The picture was taken by an ESPN photographer this past Saturday at the last spring training game of the year between the Orioles and Nats. I certainly hope that the Nationals in a weaker division than the AL East can find a way to succeed this year. Go Nats!

New Park