Azalea Blossom in the Rain

There was a gentle mist coming down two days ago when I went out to the car to go somewhere.  I needed to put my telescope in the car to take to a talk I gave and so when I walked around to the passenger side I brushed up against this Azalea bush.  I thought I would lean over and sniff the blossoms in case they had a scent, but instead I noticed all the water drops on the pedals!  OK, THAT'S a photograph!  So much more interesting than just the flower alone.  The water made it so much more interesting.

 

Abby and Her Radio Telescope

This is Abby and she gave a talk tonight at our astronomy meeting.  She has been a member of our club for a while now.  She is a senior in high school AND is headed to UCLA for college next year, to study astronomy and astrophysics!  This is a radio telescope she built to receive transmissions from space of the 21cm. hydrogen line which is radiated by some astronomical objects.  She is amazing - last year she spent a week at the Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia where the largest steerable radio telescope is located!  That's where she got the idea to build this radio telescope.

She explained in her talk everything we would need to know to build both this "horn antenna" and the radio receiver underneath it, made from a 1 gallon can, containing some electronics!  This is amazing!  She got a great reception and much applause at the end.  What a wonderful project this is.

 

The Tree Where I Stop

I stop at this tree every day I ride.  It is at the top of a short hill and it is one of my checkpoints, so I always stop and write down my time.  These roots are amazing and I am thinking this is a really old tree, based on the roots.  I did a search and based on the bark and the shape of the leaves, I think this is a Beech tree.  I would love to know how old it is.

 

The Rider Pauses

On my bike rides I have checkpoints and I keep track of my times as I pass each one.  I always want to see how I am doing on one ride compared with another.  After a winter with not much time on the bike, my times are slow, and then during Spring, they gradually get faster, which is fun to see!  Anyhow, there are a couple of places along the route when I stop to write down the times, because I can only remember three different times before I forget.  This is one of those stops at the top of a hill and when I saw this shadow, I thought it was a picture.

 

Little and Big

The Fern bank is such a joy and it is so beautiful, especially in the spring when they Ferns first come up.  There is one problem with the fern bank, however.  We have Grape ivy vines that are always trying to take over the ferns, and tiny maple trees that sprout every spring as well, as well as some other weeds.  it is a constant battle to keep the fern bank clear.  Well, the other day it was time to do my first weeding and clearing of the ferns.  On my way down the driveway, I happened to see these tiny flowers which jumped out because of their brightness.  I loved the comparison in size between the giant ferns, and the tiny flowers.

 

Cherry Blossoms

These Cherry Blossoms, ( I HOPE) they are Cherry Blossoms all over the ground and the road caught my eye as I came around a corner on one of the roads I usually ride on.  It was like snow on the ground! the blossoms looked a bit tired, so I was wishing I had come by the day before.  The scene was so beautiful seeing so many blossoms.  After I took this photograph, I decided I would do one of the tree which still had lots of blossoms on it, in hopes someone would be able to identify the tree from this second image.

 

One Last Image

One last image that I took when leaving the upstairs gallery at ICP.  I happened to turn around for one last look and saw this silhouette of a man sitting back on a couch, nearly in the dark, looking at his phone.  So I took maybe 6 frames, some closer and this one a wider view.  Just an interesting silhouette in an uncommon looking room. My last post from my day in the city last week.

 

ICP

I keep talking about the International Center of Photography, also known as ICP but I have never taken a photograph of the galleries to show you what it looks like.  The galleries are in a large space two stories high.  You can see three walls of photographs here on the lower floor, and the second floor galleries are walkways around the open space with photographs on all the walls there.  What got me to take this photograph were the two figures, one on each floor and they were one above the other, which gave me a center of interest - the "something else" which makes a photograph more interesting.  Please click on the image because it is so much more interesting to look at when it is larger.

 

I Have No Idea

We were walking away from the International Center of Photography looking for a place to have lunch, when we passed these figures on this wall.  I have no idea what this is about.  But I think I recognize Ray Charles and I think the blonde woman is Annie Lennox.  But I don't recognize the others.  I have the feeling that this is some kind of art installation.  I am not sure if the graffiti is part of this, or if someone tagged the wall after the sculptures were up.  It is unusual for me that I am not able to come up with more information, but even Google couldn't help in this case.  Do you recognize any of these people?

 

Subway Puzzle Pieces

I had to wait a long time, for some reason, for the downtown subway to ICP the other day.  So, naturally I am standing on the platform and with nothing else to do, I am looking around.  Then I see this scene as I look across the tracks for my train, and over to the platform on the other side to the uptown platform.  I am enjoying the "windows" that appear in the concrete supports and walls. which are made up of concrete columns that hold up the station, and openings in the concrete wall that separates the two tracks.  So now I have my "checkerboard" and I keep the camera to my eye as people walk by on the other platform, all going in different directions.  The people are what make this photograph interesting, in the end,  I think.

 

The Electric Stairway

At the International Center of Photography, you take an elevator from the ground floor up to the third floor, where the exhibits begin.  Then when you have seen everything on the third floor, you take the stairs down to the second floor.  When I saw these stairs illuminated like this I nearly fell over.  It looks like some outer space thing, I think.  What makes it so cool looking, and so brilliant in design, is that there are channels under each railing and in the recess of each railing are strings of LED lights!  What a cool way to light the stairs!

 

Blinding Light

When I got off my train, I walked a fair distance to get to this new stairway that runs directly up from the Long Island Railroad concourse to the street.  A real shortcut, compared to other ways of getting up to the street in the old days. But on this day, the sun was out and a lot of scaffolding up on the street had been removed and now all of the light up on the street poured into the opening and reflected off the polished stainless steel of the escalators!  I had never seen it this bright!  It literally stopped me in my tracks.  Well, for maybe 5 seconds and then I had my camera up to my eye and stood here for a few minutes trying to get interesting silhouettes in the foreground.

Relaxing on the Stoop

 

Another photograph of some citizens of Manhattan.  When Stan and I left the International Center of Photography, we went out the back door and this is what we faced!  It is the strangest thing.  All the buildings on this side of Ludlow Street look like this.  There is graffiti everywhere, and I think that perhaps this entire block is set to be demolished at some point in the not too distant future.  All the buildings like ICP on the other side of the street are modern buildings in beautiful condition.  I only discovered this fact when I used google maps to check out this location and saw all the buildings marked in graffiti.

Riding the Subway

Riding the subway is such an interesting experience.  It's a United Nations, when it comes to riders.  When you sit in your seat, you are facing a bunch of other people opposite you.  Socially it is an unusual situation to be looking at other people face to face and not that far away from you.  So you look up at the ads or the floor, or to the left and right at other riders who are not directly across from you.  It is something I love about the subway because I love looking at people, but the rules are, you don't stare.  So you pass your gaze along and only look at people for a second and usually you don't make eye contact.  Those are the rules.  I thought these two were an interesting couple.  I love the woman's bright green NY hat and her bright red shirt.  My camera was in my lap, sideways, and I could not come up with a way to point it at them, even if it was in my lap.  I know they would have seen that and been suspicious. Then I noticed others using their cell phones vertically in their laps!  So I got my phone out of my pocket and had it in my lap, and it was tinted forward at 45 degree angle and I pretended to be touching it and swiping it, and then I tilted it back a bit until it was vertical and then I clicked the shutter a few times, and was not noticed at all.  This photography stuff is hard work!

Star Child

I went to the city today to meet Stan and see the 50th anniversary exhibit at the International Center of Photography.  After we left, we were walking down Broome Street to the subway.  We walked right by her before I noticed her and it was too late to take a photograph, so we kept on walking.  When we got to the next corner, I told Stan I had to go back to try and get a photograph.  So I walked out in the middle of the street because there were trucks parked along the curb that shielded me from her.  So then I turned around at the end of the block and walked by her again on the sidewalk, with my camera ready.  I set the focal length to 35mm and held the camera down at waist level, and as I approached I kept clicking the shutter.  After I went past her, I stopped and looked at the photographs, and I was not close enough to her!  So, out to the street again, back down to the start of the block, set the focal length to 50 mm and walk by her once more.  My pointing was perfect with the camera right at her and she was larger in the image, and I was undetected, and I got the shot.  Third time's the charm!  She looks like a child, until you look closely.  She is on a coffee break no doubt with a cup of coffee on the stairs, a cigarette in her fingers, and she is relaxing reading something on her phone.  Just a typical New York scene.

 

Our Astronomy Meeting Tonight

We had a different kind of meeting tonight.  Instead of everyone facing forward listening to a speaker, we gathered in a semi-circle and had a group discussion about the Artemis mission which will return astronauts to the moon.  It is a huge, complicated project and a number of companies are all working together with NASA to accomplish this mission.  A number of our members are following this closely, so there was a lot to be learned from different people offering information.  And instead of everyone sitting there quietly, it was a lively back and forth discussing advantages and disadvantages of the program.

We are seated this way because there were members at home also taking part in the meeting using Zoom, and everyone could see them on the projection screen at the front of the room.  It was so nice having a change of pace in how our meetings are conducted, and it was so successful that we will be trying this again in the future!