One More Photo For The Road

Since I will be away for a week, I couldn't resist posting one more photo of zebras...this is one of my favorites. I had to wait a long time for all SIX zebras to put their heads down and drink. There was a lion nearby, and one of the zebras would lift its head to inspect and make sure the lion was not too close. For an instant all SIX had their heads down, and that is when I snapped the shot. Lucky.

Speaking of Zebras

I am starting a new tradition with my blog by posting a photo a day (even though I am taking a week off). I wanted to put a black and white photo up, so what better than a zebra for a black and white?

I am off to India tomorrow morning, so there will be no new blogging for a week. I am taking 20 ninth graders to Northern India for project week. We will visit the Taj Mahal, and then head north to the mountains for some rafting and camping. I am looking forward to the trip, and getting some good photos. See you all in a week or so...

Happy Halloween

Today was Halloween, and Kayla dressed as...you guessed it, a princess. Mommy wanted her to wear a crown, but Kayla refused to get her hair messed up, so the little girl wins. I went to Kayla's class today to take some photos, and Sue (Kayla's teacher) took the opportunity to have a group photo done. This is the result...a pretty darn cute class.

Africa Re-Visited

Not much to report today, so I thought I would just post a photo I just finished re-working. This was taken in Savuti, Botswana a few years ago. I am glad I saved all my old RAW files because I can now go through and make adjustments that were not available a few years ago. Very cool.

Lee Westwood Comes to Jakarta

It is not often the Asian tour comes through Indonesia. I am not sure why not either. We do have some awesome golf courses here. So, today was the final round of the President's Invitational Golf Tournament, and Lee Westwood along with some other Asian tour stars were here to show their stuff...and I must say, it was incredible watching them. Check behind Westwood to the right, and you see Butch "ooing and wowing" his drive...

Lee Westwood marks his ball on one of the greens he birdied...

Westwood brought his own caddie with him. The other Asian Tour guys used the local female caddies from Damai Indah Golf Club...

Westwood and his caddie peer down the 18th fairway, a par five. Westwood hit the green on his second shot, and sunk the putt for eagle to put him in third place...

Pagusan (sorry, don't know his first name), from the Philippines, won the tournament. He was playing in the same group with Westwood. At the 18th, he was one stroke back. He had to eagle the hole to win the tournament. The first guy in the group hit his ball short of the green into the water, Westwood hit his about 29 feet from the pin, and then this guy hit his ball about 12 feet from the pin, and sunk the eagle putt to win the tournament. It was a pretty sweet finish, and we were there to see it live. Very cool.

My Photos in the National Gallery of Art??

No, not really...just playing around with a site I found via Scott Kelby's blog...

Here is the cool link that will take your photo and put it into a National Gallery.

Not much going on Today. It is Butch's birthday, so I am about to join him for dinner with his family....

I am still majorly sore from my workouts, but hopefully, after a weekend of rest, I will be back to normal on Monday.

My favorite Underwater Photo

I don't have much to report today, as it was a pretty boring day as days go around here. So, I was going through some of my underwater photos, and came across this classic, so thought I would post it on the blog. I just like this photo. It makes me feel at ease.

Oh, I do have one thing to report. My buddy, Rob Geurten, bought this exercise video that we (me, Scott Chamberlain, Rob and Tom Bartlett) have started just yesterday. It is tough...I mean really tough. I could barely raise my arms this morning, and my legs today took a beating. It is a 12 week program, and I intend to stick with it until I am back into the shape I should be in. Wish me luck.

One Thing I Really Miss

The one thing we don't have in Indonesia is a change of seasons. I really miss the cool temperatures of the fall, and of course the colors. It is always hot here, and the only change in colors we get is wet leaves or dry leaves. Oh well....

Now THAT is a BIG BANANA

One of our pembantus (household help) came back from her kampung (village) today. When I got home, Kayla ran out to the car holding the largest banana I have ever seen. Kasmi brought back some very large bananas. They must be on steroids down there. Wow, what a banana!!

I know my family is anxiously awaiting the new news on Tika. She went to the doctor yesterday to find out if she is pregnant or not. Well, it is inconclusive at this point, but there are positive signs pointing towards possible pregnancy. She has to go back on Thursday for some more tests...so, stay tuned.

Back to Work

Yep, it was back to work today. Actually, it wasn't bad. I was starting to get bored around the house anyway. The only bad part was getting up so early...that hurt.

Kayla had her first swim lessons today at school. She made a special call to me to tell me that she put her face in the water twice..."Daddy, TWO TIMES, I put my face in the water...TWO TIMES, DADDY"...pretty cute.

Another One From Cambodia

Here is another shot that almost got tossed...glad I kept it.

Photos of the Day

All I can say is..."I am having so much fun" with my new computer and playing with old photos...I like these from Cambodia.

Santorini Re-Visited

Another day of baseball in the morning, golf in the afternoon, and then a couple of hours sitting at the computer at night.

I re-worked a couple more of my old Santorini photos...thought you might like these...

An "Ape" of a Day

Kayla's favorite thing to do at the zoo is visit the Monkeys and Orangutangs. The Ragunan Zoo has an excellent ape and monkey facility...I think one of the best in the world. This is a shot of one of the Orangutangs at the zoo.

I have been playing lots of golf, and will play again tomorrow at Rainbow Hills. I have been playing pretty well, but falling apart on the second nine. It is just too hot, and I lose my energy at around the 12th hole.....arggggh.

Not much else going on....only a couple of days left of vacation.

Making a Black and White

Ok, more playing around with Photoshop. I took a few hours today between watching two baseball games, visiting the building site, and eating and napping to work on some new photoshop techniques I recently learned. Check out the conversion above. Amazing how you can take an otherwise pretty drab photograph and turn it into a piece of art. Luckily, I didn't throw this photo out.

House is Quiet

We went to the house today. Usually, there are about 40 guys working on the house. Today, there were only two guys there watching over the house. It was very quiet. Most all the workers are in the village visiting their families...so not much "new" work has been done. It was nice, however, to cruise around without anyone following us.

Below is a photo of what will be the kitchen, open terrace, and the glass walkway above the kithchen. The kitchen will be in the corner where the two windows are. The steel beams above will support the glass walkway.

The small Mango tree we planted a few months ago is already growing some nice Mangos...Kayla wanted to pick them, but they are not quite ready, but will be soon...

New Gallery - A Day in the Ghetto

With lots of time on my hands (on vacation), I was messing around with my old photos I took one day a couple of years ago at the boat yard and ghetto in North Jakarta. Using Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop, you can create some pretty wild looking photos. I think they look cool, and "painting" like, so I made an entire gallery of them. Click here to see the gallery.

Morning at the Zoo

This morning, we decided to go to the zoo since most everyone in Jakarta was at home. (Today is Idul Fitri). When Rob and I arrived at the Zoo, we were the ONLY people there. Wow, what a treat. We were able to walk around with not a single person bothering us. Of course, Kayla's favorite was the monkeys. The chimp above liked Rob so much, he spit at him twice.

Colameco Cup 2007

I forgot to put a blog entry in for last Saturday when the annual Colameco Cup was played. The Colameco Cup is played every year in honor of our good friend, Andy Colameco. Andy was a teacher and a Principal at JIS, and was loved by all. He passed away a few years ago with Leukemia. His favorite golf tournament was the JIS Ryder Cup where the rest of the world takes on the Americans. The ROTW has dominated over the years, but the Americans are quickly catching up. In fact, we are only one win behind the ROTW after this years TIE. Yes, it was a TIE this year...therefore, the Americans retain the cup.

The cup was not without a bit of controversy, however. On the last hole in one match, an American kicked his ball before putting out. His opponent then out of the goodness of his heart, let him have the putt, but then missed his own two-footer leaving the match in a draw. Had a penalty stroke been given to the American who kicked his ball, we would have lost the match, and the tournament. The ROTW captain has emailed the officials in Ireland (he really has), to ask what the ruling would be for a kicked ball.

As it stands now, though, the Americans retain the cup....it was a great day of golf all around for all of us, and always a fun day.

Still Experimenting

This is an example of an HDR (High Dynamic Range) image. It was processed using a single RAW file, and then post processed in Photoshop CS3. I have been playing with my new program called Photomatrix that converts HDR images. It takes some practice, but I like the results above.

Trying Something New...

Ok, I have been working the past few hours on trying to post larger photos on my blog. Ah, figured it out...this is cool. No more whimpy photos on my blog....

Finally, A Break From Work

It's official....October Break starts today. Yes!! We had parent conferences all day yesterday, and I saw 25 sets of parents. It actually went faster and better than I thought. Most of the parents I saw had kids who were getting grades of A or better. I guess they want to come in and hear nice things about their kid....I guess I would do the same thing.

Tomorrow is Idul Fitri, and Jakarta seems like a ghost town. I drove Tika this morning to the clinic to get a shot, and it took us only 10 minutes to get there...it usually takes us and hour and a half. It was unreal. I wish it were always like this....I would never leave Jakarta if it were...what a difference no traffic makes in one's life.

My goals for my week off are to watch baseball on TV every morning, play a couple of rounds of golf, to finish off a few of my photos, and to start on my new photo project (will tell you more about this later). All of our household help are gone to the Kampung to see their families...so, we have to do all of our own cleaning, cooking, laundry, etc....very strange.

New Lightroom Technique

Every once in a while, I get a really good tip from one of the several Photoshop websites I check out daily. Not sure if you can really see the difference in the two photos above (because I am limited on what I can show on the web), but this was all done in Adobe's new Lightroom in just a couple of minutes. I got the technique from Matt Kloskowski's website here.
Check it out....it is cool.

Trying to Make Another One of These

Today was the big day... it was the day when two embryos that have been growing in a test tube the past five days, were transferred into Tika's body. The transfer has been made, and now we wait for a couple of weeks to see if she actually becomes pregnant. Keep your fingers crossed.

High School Musical at JIS

This week, I spent two days after school taking photos of the dress rehearsal of the ever popular High School Musical. JIS paid a big chunk of cash to get the script and music for the play. My good friend, Tom Schulz, is directing the play this year as he is now the drama teacher in the high school. Also, in the top photo, are two teachers at JIS....Virginia Neely, an English teacher, and Gene Magill who is teaching at JIS for his last year (he has been here since the early 80's)....both are really good in the play. The middle photo is Jenny Fontenot, who was one of my students last year. She is playing the lead, and is awesome. The Graham's are going to the play tomorrow afternoon for the 4:00 show.