Gantry Cranes

These machines are astounding!  They are called "container handling gantry cranes" and they are used for loading and unloading intermodal containers from container ships.  I photographed these in Long Beach, California, when the ferry to Santa Catalina island was heading down the Los Angeles River and out through the harbor.  These things are huge!  You can see some containers on the left side of the photograph, and each one is twenty feet tall.  So do the math.  When a ship docks for loading, the crane part which is at an angle here, will come down to the horizontal position, and start lifting containers either on or off the ships.  I love this photograph because it looks at these machines as sculptures.  Please click on the image to see it in more detail.

Portrait

This is my friend John.  He is a brilliant photographer of nature, and he was an art director who did a lot of record covers for 33 1/3 LP records, among other things, during his career.  He has done some stunning images by taking things like a sunflower, and then scanning it on a flatbed scanner, then printing it.  I have one of his framed images done like that, hanging on the wall in our living room.  I was helping him today do an upgrade to the Macintosh operating system on his computer, and we had a while to wait for the process, so we both were playing with some of the apps on our iPhones.  I liked this image so much, though, that I used my toy camera for this picture, because the quality is much better.

A Warm and Cozy Fireplace

The gas fireplace has been in place for a while now, and a week or so ago one of the finishing carpenters installed the three pieces of black and green marble, and built the mantelpiece and installed it.  Today a technician came from the fireplace installer, and checked the hookups of gas and electric, and fired up the fireplace for the first time!  We have to let it burn for six hours or more, because the heat causes fumes to be emitted by the paint covering the metal pieces that make up the fireplace.  After it burns for a while, the fumes will go away.  Hey, this is pretty, isn't it?  Wait until the mantel is painted white, and the walls a light gray-green color.

Trifecta!

I am not sure if Trifecta is the correct term, but it is unusual that I can get all three of the cats in one photograph.  I loved the arrangement of them in this shot, with Bebe curled up on the folded blanket on the back of the couch.  Funny thing when taking this - Sam, the gray kitten to the left - was originally facing me when I took the first shot - slightly out of focus.  By the time I snapped this one, he had changed his position.  Who would guess that you would need the reaction times of a sports photographer to photograph three sleeping kittens!

High Water

Thank heavens that the hurricane passed safely offshore.  We had a lot of rain and gray skies, and a fair amount of wind, but nothing serious.  It is interesting that I drove to the Apple store today and it was closed because they had no power.  The water was really high, at high tide today, but there were no waves to speak of.

CA Wheels

Does this car say "California" or what!  Found it in Liz' neighborhood while out walking one day.  I am not a motorhead, but this thing is a beauty.  Only thing is, there is a lot missing inside the car!  There is no horn in the steering wheel, and I forget some of the other things.  I guess that can be forgiven because this machine is so cool!

Wilshire Blvd

We were walking along Wilshire Boulevard between a restaurant and a grocery store, and I was just looking around when I noticed this hedge and the grasses.  It seemed so out of place somehow to find this amongst all the concrete.  And yet is was like an oasis.  So I stopped to look at it carefully and I loved finding all the waves and swirls in the grasses.  Please click on it to see it with more detail.