Amy and Vivian are here! Oh happy day! The is the moment they were getting in the car at JFK when we picked them up. It was a madhouse, with cars 4 lanes deep! To add to the fun, I had to park while Amy installed the booster seat for Vivian and had to lock it down with the seatbelt. But here's the best part... They waited at baggage claim for their suitcase, and the booster chair which they brought with them. The suitcase arrived, but not the chair. So she went to the baggage claim office and the woman apologized that here seat was not on the flight, but would follow on another flight. Amy said "But what do I do - my daughter can't ride in a car without her seat?" "Oh, we will lend you a booster chair, and then have yours delivered to you tomorrow." And Amy said, "and will they pick up this seat?" "No," the woman said. "You can keep this one." And then she brought out a sealed cardboard box and gave it to Amy. A brand new booster seat! Wow! I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but I am so impressed with the airline, jetBlue for thinking of what to do in a situation when a seat does not arrive with the passengers. Man, that is awesome customer service! That's why jetBlue is "our" airline and the one we fly with whenever we can!
Monday, June 30, 2025
Sunday, June 29, 2025
Bumble Bees in the Lavender
I was walking out to the car when I noticed that the lavender in the garden by the driveway was buzzing with bees. I was amazed at how many were in amongst the blossoms. So I got my camera and close up lens and started photographing. I was as close as 6 inches to the bees but they didn't seem to be bothered by my presence, which was good. I didn't think I would be stung by them because I wasn't doing anything threatening. Well, I WAS six inches away, but they were busy. I shot 71 frames and they were moving so quickly that the majority of them were not in focus or the bee was flying away by the time I pressed the shutter release. I discovered that these bees are "Two-spotted bumble bees." And from Wikipedia "Bumble bees typically only sting when defending their nest or when captured. Bumble bees are different from honeybees. They do collect pollen, but they make very little honey from it. And they live in much smaller colonies.
Saturday, June 28, 2025
Baseball Kid
We went to a memorial service today at a funeral home for a friend of someone that Kathy knows. When we arrived at the funeral home there was a large pergola over the entrance. Underneath the outer edge of it was this small statue of a boy with a baseball hat and bat. It is the cutest statue ever! I took note of it and when the service was over I came back out and did a number of photos of the statue with my cellphone. I just love this silhouette version. I never bothered to ask when we were inside, why this statue was there. But seeing it made me feel good. So I guess that's why the funeral home put it there.
Friday, June 27, 2025
Bill Moyers 1934 - 2025
Bill Moyers died yesterday. I first met him in 1967 when he became the Publisher of Newsday. I was coming out of the building and he was walking up to the front door. Everyone knew he was coming of course. I just thought I would say "Hi" as we passed each other. Instead he stopped and put out his hand and said "Hi I'm Bill Moyers." He was a gentleman and I was so touched by that, that he would introduce himself to me. He left Newsday in 1970, just before the sale of the paper to the Los Angeles Times. He continued to live in Garden City and I had occasion to photograph him for a story in Newsday some years later, after he started working at PBS. This is my portrait of him at the time and when he saw it published he asked if he could buy a number of prints to use as is official portrait, which Newsday arranged. At some point I asked him if he would sign a print for me and he said ""Of course" and I sent this print to him. When it came back to me after a while, it was stained with coffee down in the corner! I had to laugh, because this is something I might have done! He inscription on the print says: "To Ken - who has the eye of an artist and sees the best in a lot of us - from his friend Bill Moyers." Along with it was this hand written note, below... wow...
Thursday, June 26, 2025
A Two Foot Flower Pot
Foold you! When you read "two foot flowerpot" I bet you thought I meant twenty four inches! We went to Stop n Shop for a couple of items and I could not believe my eyes when I sat these two foot flower ots on a rack at the entrance of the store! That's an easy blog shot for sure! I am astounded at how clever these pots are! I mean, really, just brilliant. You would be interested to know that we didn't buy one, of course!
Wednesday, June 25, 2025
OK, Enough of that New York City Stuff
Man, I really messed up today. I parked my car at CVS and noticed these beautiful bright yellow flowers right in front of me. They are Yarrow. So I got my little Canon T7i out of the trunk where it rides with me everywhere. I put a telephoto lens on it that went from 88mm to 400mm because I wanted to isolate the blossoms from the background. So I kept the lens wide open. so the background would not be sharp. This was the first shot I took. I did a lot of different versions, some with many flowers in the frame, but this shot was the most dramatic, and I am happy with it. It looks like it was taken in someone's garden. In fact, these flowers were in a 4 foot wide strip between a concrete sidewalk and a macadam parking lot! I realized now that it would be so interesting if I had taken a wide angle photograph showing where these flowers really were. The whole time I was photographing my object was to make it look like these flowers were growing in some endless garden.
Tuesday, June 24, 2025
New Architecture
This is a brand new building right across the street from the Javits Center. I was struck by how different the outside walls were from anything else I have seen in the city. It is striking because it is all black, and then the glass "curtain walls" are not smooth! An overcast day was the perfect kind of lighting for this building because we can see all the details without the distraction of shadows.
Here is a close up of a group of rooms. I had to dig a bit to find out what this building is. I Googled "black tower across from the Javits Center," strangely enough! I discovered that it is the Hotel Meta, also known as the Tribute Portfolio Hotel. It's a 51 story hotel skyscraper. The building features a unique, kinetic-looking design and is located at the corner of West 37th Street and Eleventh Avenue. Aren't you glad I am out here hunting for new developments in architecture in New York City?
Monday, June 23, 2025
Photo Shoot III
A group of us took a lunch break and decided to leave the venu to go to a nearby restaurant. On the way back, right on the corner of the Javits Center we saw this - another photo shoot. I am not sure what the photographers were featuring. The guy in the orange baseball cap just to the right of center is holding a battery operated light and at the edge of the right frame is a silver reflector. This model was one of the hardest working models at the show. She was doing all kinds of moves with her roller skates on and getting into all kinds of contortions. I can't believe that any kind of beautiful photograph resulted from these poses, but it wasn't her fault. Crazy place to have a photoshoot, in Manhattan, huh?
Sunday, June 22, 2025
Don't Hold it Like This
In this show there were cameras and lenses at every booth, it seemed. What is great is that you can ask to see a particular camera and a certain lens and then hold that setup and look through it and get a sense of how that combination feels. When I saw this gentleman hollding this camera with a long, and relatively heavy telephoto lens, I had to smile and so I took this photograph. Why did I smile?
A few years ago when Stan was preparing to teach a college class of beginning photography he asked if he could come out and do some photographs of me, Showing the wrong way and the right way of holding a camera in certain circumstanced. So this is NOT the way to hold a camera ever! Especially if you have a telephoto lens on it. A lens like that is heavy and your arms will get tired and you will not be able to hold the camera as steady as you would doing it the right way!
When you hold the camera and lens this way, you actually hold the camera tightly to your face, and then you jam your elbows into your chest, so you sort of turn you arms and head into a tripod and the camera is so much steadier! I hadn't noticed this, but Stan has said he sees people doing this the wrong way all the time! So when I saw the gentleman at the photo show, I just had to take his photograph.
Saturday, June 21, 2025
Blowing Bubbles
So this was the entertainment at the Adobe booth. They, of course, make Adobe Photoshop, and Lightroom which I both use, as well as a number of other applications for design and publication. This fellow was the star of the show, making really huge bubbles and then blowing into them to make bubbles inside bubbles. He was a big hit, and he really seemed to be enjoying his work! This is my favorite photograph from what I shot, but it may be hard to tell what is going on. So I am including the photograph below.
He has two pieces of plastic tubing about 18" long connected to a "Y" shaped blue braided cord, which he dips into a container of soapy water. Then he lifts the cord out and walks backwards and the bub bubbles form. It was a joy to watch - What is it that turns adults into children when we see bubbles!
Friday, June 20, 2025
Tethered
I was heading towards the door to leave the event when I saw this. It was the straight line of the charging cord from the woman's phone to the outlet that grabbed me when I saw it. So I shot a few frames and in some of them, I included more of the person on the left hand edge of the frame. but chose this one because that other person was distracting, I thought. When I was editing the photographs, I suddenly realized that this woman was not tall enough to plug her charger in! I guess she had help.
Thursday, June 19, 2025
Photo Shoot II
At this photographic show, there were many booths set up by camera manufacturers, and lighting companies and other kinds of photographic accessories manufacturers. They would have a background and some props and a model or two dressed in unusual ways, and then there would be either a photographer demonstrating some lighting techniques or camera techniques, or the purpose of the models is that visitors to the exhibition can photograph the models as they do various poses. There were male and female models, and in one astounding setup that was crowded with photographers, there was a small version of half a subway car lit with colored lights and three models in the car. Very clever. So this is one of the settings where the photographers who are walking by can stop and shoot. Here are some of those photographers at work with their cameras.
And these are the two models who were posing against the background for the photographers. They worked really hard constantly changing their poses and they were so patient with the photographers. They must be exhausted at the end of the day.
Wednesday, June 18, 2025
Photo Shoot
Stan and I were sort of heading for the door to leave the event yesterday. We stopped to look at something and I happened to glance over and saw this! Not sure exactly what grabbed me first - perhaps the stance of the photographer and his model with their hands touching, but the shiny steel door with subtle reflections was clearly part of the attraction. So I took perhaps 4 or 5 exposures. I WISH that I had then waited until the photographer was done shooting and gone over to them, and asked the photographer if I could see one of his shots, and shown him my shot! I have learned that as a photographer I absolutely cannot judge whether or not a photographer is taking a great shot or not, by watching them work. I can try to imagine what he is getting, but I don't know for sure. He may be getting a really interesting photograph. Actually it is unlike me not to go talk to them, but I guess because we were leaving, for some reason at the time, I never thought to show him my shot and ask to see his.
Tuesday, June 17, 2025
The Buildings are Disappearing in New York City!
I went to the city today to meet some friends and to visit the BILD Expo put on by B&H Photo. It is a giant extravaganza having to do with cameras, lenses, lighting, sound, video and everything else having to do with photography and video. As I walked out of Penn Station I was stopped in my tracks by the sight of these two skyscrapers enveloped in fog! The ceiling, or cloud base, was about 500 feet. It was so cool to see this!
I always walk over to the Javits Center, just short of a mile one way, so I got a lot more views of other disappearing skyscrapers. I just love these atmospheric effects!
I particularly love this dark black building, in contrast to the lighter, glass surfaced buildings. One other thing I just realized is that these photographs look they were shot in black & white, but they were not - each of these images is in color! This was such a cool thing to see!
Monday, June 16, 2025
A Community Information Meeting
There was a community information meeting tonight at the village hall. There is a building at the bottom of our street that I have photographed before that is left over from the old water company. The village bought it and are now trying to figure out what to use it for for the good of the village. The room was packed - standing room only. Many of our neighbors were there, because it is on our street and any traffic and parking issues will directly affect us.
A number of people wished to speak, including me. We had not heard anything about this building in two years, except that we could see it was being refurbished and the big question on everyone's mind was, "what will this building be used for?" The answer is its use has not been determined yet.
I like this photograph because you can see varying expressions on the faces of the people present. We have almost never been to a village board meeting, so this was really interesting, particularly because it may affect us and our neighbors. When there is anymore news about the building, I will be sure and let you know.
I thought I might as well look up one of the photographs I did of the old building and post it, so you can get an idea of what the inside of the building looked like in 2022. I have not looked inside recently.
Sunday, June 15, 2025
Texas Leftovers
I still have some unedited folders of photographs from the Big Bend trip. I took this because it gives a better sense of the nature of the Chinati Foundation being located on an old U.S.Army base. I had not seen a good view that shows the number of Army barracks that are located here. This view shows that nicely, I thought and the really interesting Yucca in the center of the photograph adds a lot of interest.
Saturday, June 14, 2025
A Rose, A Challenge
When Kathy watched me photograph the candle in the little glass box with all the reflections, and I said I was making a blog photograph, she asked if I could make a blog photograph of this rose from the new bush she just bought and planted. I accepted gthe challenge and here is my photograph. Kathy "styled" the photo, finding this beautiful little blue vase, and arranged the leaves on the rose stem. So, not the greatest photograph in the world, but a decent close up of a single rose blossom, I think.
Friday, June 13, 2025
Get off that roof! What's wrong with you?

There is nothing wrong with me! Well mostly... :-). We have had moss growing on this roof over the front porch for a number of years now. It made the roof look terrible. This is a north facing roof, and there is a really tall Hickory tree that overhangs the roof, so that makes it worse. You can see the thick brown covering on the roof behind me. I bought some liquid moss killer and carefully sprayed it on, and within a month the moss turned brown but it was sticking to the shingles as well as it was when it was green. I tried a brush with no luck. One time I put my gloved hands on the roof and rolled them around on the moss and it rolled up in balls and came off the roof, but that would be really difficult on the whole front roof. So I decided to use my little power washer which is electric and maybe 20" long and 10" in diameter so I could put that on the roof and tie it to a rope that was in the front bedroom. The power washer, used carefully worked like a charm. The roof finally looks brand new almost. In addition to the moss the shingles had a dark color to them, and that came off easily. You can see I am being very safe with an orange safety line which is tied to a rock climbing harness I have had for years for just such things. Safety at all times. It took me two days of this work to get the roof cleaned and it looks beautiful!
Thursday, June 12, 2025
Ten Candles
We always light a candle in a candlestick in the center of the dining table while having dinner. Just a thing we do. Tonight it was warm so we had all the dining room windows open and the front living room windows as well. There was a gentle breeze drifting through the windows and it would blow the candle flame sideways and wax would be running down the side of the candle. So rather than close the windows, Kathy said we could use this glass holder for the little candles in cups. It is a glass box with an open top so the flame is not blown around. So we were eating dinner and Kathy mentioned seeing a lot of candle flames in the reflections. I guess I had not noticed that before and when I did I thought it worthy of a photograph. And here it is!
Wednesday, June 11, 2025
Comets and Meteors and Asteroids and Junk
We had a terrific program at my astronomy club tonight. This is Charlie who is the Astronomy Outreach Coordinator for the Vanderbilt Planetarium, and he gave a talk on a lot of the "stuff" up there in space, like Comets and Meteors and Asteroids. He also talked about all the space "junk" that we have put into orbit around Earth and about how hazardous it can be to satellites and manned space missions. Here he shows what the head of a comet looks like seen up close by a space mission. We all know what a comet looks like from a distance with its long tail or tails, but this is a closeup. He covered so much material and it was wonderful!
Tuesday, June 10, 2025
Faded Flowers
I was sitting in a chair in the back room when I looked closely at this vase of flowers. It has b een sitting on this table for 4 or 5 days I think. It was so nice when Kathy brought in some fresh flowers from the garden and put them in this vase. I hadn't been paying much attention to them but I knew there were there and that they looked nice. Until I looked the other day. They have been fading for a couyple of days, I think and I noticed that. But then I thought how beautiful these flowers are, even in decline. I still think they are beautiful in this condition so I photographed them. For you to see.
Monday, June 9, 2025
The Car Crash
I went over to Starbucks and CVS this afternoon. This road was blocked because of these two bucket trucks at work reinstalling a huge power pole. I stopped and asked one fo the flagmen if the pole had been hit by something. And, wow, did he have a story! He said that late last night a probably stolen Mercedes SUV came toward where I am standing through the intersection I am looking at. There is a little jog in this street, and the car was moving at over 70 MPH! Thank heavens there was no other car going through the intersection! When the car missed the jog in the road and hit this giant power pole, the impact broke the pole in half! Then the car continued toward me and hit yet another, smaller power pole!
This is the second pole the car hit. Notice the splintered wood from one of the power poles in the foreground! I cannot imagine the power of the impact.
The splintered wood from one of the power poles, and in the dark area in the background, pieces of the car.
Look at all these pieces from what was once a car! I would love to see what the car looks like! The flagman said that the driver got out of the wreckage and ran away! I guess that says a lot about Mercedes construction and air bags! Wow! I keep thinking that if another car had been in the intersection and had been hit by this car, everyone in that car would have died. That is beyond imagining.
Sunday, June 8, 2025
O.K. Have it Your Way!
OK, so this is a first! My long time friend Primo said that he loved this photograph, and the light, but then he said he was surprised that I left the car in the photograph which he thought was distracting. He said I should have moved the car! Honestly, it never occurred to me because I thought that it was not very prominent in the picture. So here's what I did with that photograph... Welcome to AI in Photoshop! There is a relatively new function in Photoshop called "Generative Fill" and the first time I saw a demonstration I nearly fell over! Here's how it works: I used a selection called the "lasso tool" and then in this case I circled the car. Then I chose "Generative Fill" and watch the progress bar and when it is done, the car was GONE! I kid you not! And the light from the garage was extended to where the car was. Look at this! Unbelievable that the AI had the light narrow and fade as it got to the left side of the image! I mean, come ON! So I hope Primo is pleased with this rendition, with no car!
Saturday, June 7, 2025
The Glowing Garage

I don't remember what I was doing before I took this photograph. Maybe I had been observing, which would explain why the garage lights were on, as they would be when I was done, and putting things away and bringing the telescope in the house. Then I would be going back out to the garage for more stuff. In any case, I just love the look of the garage glowing in the dark, so to speak. What a nice sense of light in this photograph!
Friday, June 6, 2025
Light Trespass
"Light Trespass" is actually a legal term. It occurs when someone has "security lights" or some other kind of outdoor lighting on their house, and the light shines away from their property and onto someone else's property. Fortunately the village does have a light trespass ordinance, and it is not allowed. So the people who live up behind us put in a swimming pool and then put four bright lights on their house to illuminate the pool and patio area. Not a problem, of course if they are out enjoying their pool and patio. But every once in a while the lights get left on all night, and usually all day before someone notices, or in this case, when they are away. These lights have been on both night and day for the last 5 days or so. You can see how they light up part of the back of our house. More importantly, notice that the light is going through our bedroom window on the second floor and it lights up our whole bedroom!
Our neighbors are very nice and I am sure it happened by accident but no one seemed to be at home. The good news is that last night the lights were off. But then today they came back on! But after about 9 PM they were turned off and the whole house is dark. Go figure. For all you photographers out there, I will tell you a crazy story. I didn't want to get a tripod to put the camera on to take these photographs at midnight. So I just cranked the ISO (which is like the "film speed") to - hold on to your hats - ISO 204,800. That is not a misprint. But that is a CRAZY number, given most of my life I shot color and black and white film with an ISO of about 400! And my exposure at that ISO was 1/30 second at f/4, handheld. These digital cameras, like my SONY a7 III are simply amazing.
Thursday, June 5, 2025
A Doorway
I had lunch with two new friends from the astronomy club. The husband is an architect and has an office in Oyster Bay. We had a nice lunch together with great conversations about architecture, astronomy, night sky photography, and life. On the way back to the office, we passed some older homes in the village that have been beautifully restored. When I saw this doorway with the black door and the white wreath I stopped in mhy tracks. Photography time! I just thought that this was so beautiful.
Wednesday, June 4, 2025
GAS
I still have a couple of posts from the Big Bend trip but they require a lot of editing. So here is something I shot tonight on the way to my astronomy meeting. I have been waiting to photograph this sign for several months now. I needed the sun to bew higher in the sky to illuminate the scene. I thought that tonight the sun might be on the sign, but it was not. But I think this light is fine for this subject. This is a type of subject matter that Stan and I call "American Vernacular" which is usually used to describe a particularly American type of architecture. Home grown, particularly American and likely to be designed and built by one person with no formal training. So you get the idea. This sign has been here as long as I have been on Long Island, and clearly long before that. It is next to a farm stand, and there are actually three gas pumps near where I am standing but I have never seen anyone buy gas here. No matter, it is a wonderful, classic gasoline station sign, don't you think?
Tuesday, June 3, 2025
An Art Piece
In Marfa there is a seemingly empty lot where it looks as if a bunch of plants have been stored. And coming up out of all that is the giant stalk of a Sotol plant in amongst the buildings. It is such an unusual scene to see this giant plant in this place. We found out later on that it was an art installation, and part of the Chinati Foundation.
Monday, June 2, 2025
Intermission - The Sun
I have another post or two from the Chinati Foundation, but the sun had a magnificent complex grouping of sunspots today and so I set up my telescope and photographed the sun.
The main thing of interest to me is these three large spots in a row. If you click on this image it will be larger and you can see how many smaller spots there are in this grouping, and then even tinier ones. Far too many to count. A really exciting thing to see. The sun goes through 11 year cycles that begin with no spots on the sun at all, to a sun that looks like this, and then at the end of the cycle it goes back to having no spots at all. Just another fascinating part of this universe we live in
Sunday, June 1, 2025
15 Untitled Works in Concrete
So this is another astounding artwork! It is called "15 untitled works in concrete" but that title is misleading because one of these works may consist of from 2 boxes up to 6 boxes or more. I counted from a satellite photograph about 60 concrete boxes in groups. They are installed out in a line and the length of the exhibit is about half a mile. All the boxes are the same size, 2.5 x 2.5 x 5 meters and the concrete is about 10" thick. Please click on each photo to see much more detail. Thanks.
What is fascinating is the arrangement. Some boxes are open on the sides, some only on the ends, and some are only open on one side. I am showing you some overall shots so you get a sense of the exhibit. But the fun for Stan and I was to examine, one by one, each group of boxes and then try to find interesting compositions in each group. It was so much fun because it was really intense just looking and looking for the best arrangement. More on that tomorrow, when I will show you some of the close ups of the arrangements.
Here is Stan in the center, and a guy we met who was viewing the exhibit. He was from Texas and had just retired from work the day before and was enjoying the exhibit as much as we were, without taking photographs. Tomorrow's photographs will be really interesting, I promise!
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